"You speak as if I had gone to school in 'old Jericho,' " said my father, laughing. "I have the vaguest idea, Daisy, that such a city existed. That is all."
"Sit down, papa, while breakfast is getting ready, and let me mend your knowledge."
So we read the story there, on the stone by the spring. Mr. Dinwiddie joined us; and it was presently decided that we should spend the morning in examining the ground in our neighbourhood and the old sites of what had passed away. So after breakfast we sat out upon a walk over the territory of old Jericho.
"But it is strange," said papa, "if the city was here, that there are no architectural remains to testify as much."
"We rarely find them, sir, but in connection with Roman or Saracenic work. Shapeless mounds, and broken pottery, as you have it here, are all that generally mark our Palestine ruins."
"But Herod?" said papa. "He was a builder."
"Herod's Jericho was a mile and a half away, to the east. And moreover, if anything had been remaining here that could be made of use, the Saracens or Crusaders would have pulled it to pieces to help make their sugar mills up yonder, or their aqueducts."
"There is no sugar cane here now?"
"Not a trace of it. Nor a palm tree; though Jericho was a city of palms; nor a root of the balsam, though great gain was derived to Judea in ancient times from the balsam gardens here."
We mounted our horses and rode down to the site of Herod's Jericho, on the banks of the little stream that issues from the gorge of the Wady Kelt. How lovely, and how desolate, it was. The stream overhung with trees and bordered with oleanders and shrubs of which I have forgotten the names, and crossed by old arches still; and around, the desolate tokens of what once was. Foundation lines, and ruined aqueducts. Mr. Dinwiddie made us remark the pavement of the road leading up to the Kelt, the old road to Jerusalem, the road by which Jesus went when the blind men called him, and over which, somewhere on its way, stretched the sycamore tree into which Zaccheus climbed. Ah how barren and empty the way looked now! - with Him no longer here. For a moment, so looked my own path before me, - the dusty, hot road; the desolate pass; the barren mountain top. It was only a freak of fancy; I do not know what brought it. I had not felt so a moment before, and I did not a moment after.
"Where His feet lead now, the green pastures are not wanting,-" Mr. Dinwiddie said; I suppose reading my look.
"Never, Mr. Dinwiddie?"
"Never!"
"But itseems, often, to people, that they are wanting."
"Their eyes are so blinded by tears that they cannot see them, sometimes. Even then, they can lie down and feel them, - feel that they are in them."
"Are there any sycamore trees here now?" my father asked.
"Two or three poor old specimens; just enough to show for the story. Those sycamore figs belong to the low and warm situations; this is the proper place for them."
Papa felt so well that we determined to push on to the Jordan. It was a hot, long ride, over a shadeless and barren plain; and when we came to the river papa declared himself very much disappointed. But I was not. Narrow and muddy as the stream was, it was also powerful in its rapid flood; no one could venture to bathe in it. The river was much swollen and had been yet more so; the tracks of wild animals which the floods had disturbed were everywhere to be seen. Papa and Mr. Dinwiddie reasoned and argued, while I sat and meditated; in a deep delight that I should see the Jordan at all. We took a long rest there, on its banks. The jungle was a delicious study to me, and when the deep talk of the gentlemen subsided enough to give me a chance, I got Mr. Dinwiddie to enlighten me as to the names and qualities of the various trees and plants. They were of fine luxuriant growth. Poplars and sycamores and other trees, willows, I think, and exquisite tamarisks in blossom; and what I specially admired, the canes. I understood then how people might go into the plain to see "a reed shaken with the wind." Growing twelve to fifteen feet high, with graceful tufts of feathery bloom which they bow and sway to the breeze in a manner lovely to see.
Another day we rode down to the shore of the Dead Sea; papa being none the worse for his Jordan excursion. Then the rain visited us, and for two or three days we were kept in our tents. With some difficulty I then persuaded papa to go further south, to the shore of the Dead Sea, to some pleasant camping ground by one of its western springs; there rain falls almost never. So, first at Ain Feshkah and then at Ain Jidi, we spent another couple of weeks; without Mr. Dinwiddie it would have been impossible, but his society kept papa from wearying and made everything as enjoyable as could be to both of us. It was the middle of February when we returned to Jerusalem.
The rainy season was not of course at an end yet; but a change of beauty had come over the land. We found fruit trees in blossom, almond and peach; and apricots just ready to bloom. Corn up and green; and flowers coming and come. I had my own plans, made up from the experience and counsels of my English friends; but papa wanted to see Jerusalem, and I waited. Of course I wanted to see Jerusalem too; and here again Mr. Dinwiddie was our excellent friend and guide and instructor. Papa was quite in earnest now; and went about the city examining walls and churches and rock-tombs and all the environs, with a diligent intentness almost equal to mine; and he and Mr. Dinwiddie had endless talks and discussions, while I mused. The words, "Constantine," "Byzantine," "Crusaders," "Helena", "Saracenic," "Herod," "Josephus;" with modern names almost as well known; echoed and re-echoed in my ears.
"Daisy!" said papa suddenly in one of these talks, - "Daisy! you are not interested in this."
"Papa, it is so uncertain."
Mr. Dinwiddie laughed.
"But the question, child; don't you care about the question? how is it ever to be made certain? I thought this question would engage all your attention."
"How can it ever be made certain, papa? After those hundred and fifty years when there were no Jews allowed here, who was to remember the spot of the Sepulchre? Few but Christians knew it, in the first place."
"Oh, youhavethought about it!" said papa. "But are you not interested in aprobablesite, Daisy?"
"No, papa."
"All these old churches and relics then do not concern you?"
"Papa, I only go to see them for your sake."
"Well," said papa, "now I will go to the Mount of Olives for your sake."
That was my plan; following the advice of the English party, who said they had enjoyed it. We hired for a time a little stone dwelling on the Mount of Olives, from which we had a fine view of the city; and to this new home papa and I moved, and took up our quarters in it. Of all my days in the Holy Land, excepting perhaps the time spent at Jericho and Engedi, these days were the best. They are like a jewel of treasure in my memory.
The little dwelling to which we had come was rougher in accommodation than our tents; but the season was still early, and it gave better shelter to papa. It was a rude stone house, with a few small rooms at our service; which I soon made comfortable with carpets and cushions. The flat roof above gave us a delightful view of the country and abundant chance to examine and watch all its points and aspects. I spent the hours up here or at the window of our little sitting-room; using my eyes all the time, to take in and feast upon what was before them. Only when papa would go out with me, I left my post; to take up the survey from some new point of view. I had a great deal to think of, those days; a certain crisis in my life had come, or was coming; I was facing it and getting ready for it; and thinking and looking seemed to help and stimulate each other. It was wonderful to watch the lights change on Jerusalem; from the first sunbeam that came over the hills of Moab and touched the city, to the full glare of the midday, and then the sunset colours on land and rock and building, transforming the dull greys and whites with a flush of rosy beauty and purple splendour. The tints that hovered then upon the red hills of Moab were never to be forgotten. I watched it, this change of light and shade and colour, from day to day. I learned to know Jerusalem and her surrounding hills and her enclosing valleys; and the barrier wall of Moab became a familiar line to me. All this while, as I said, I had a great deal to think of, and was thinking. Past, present and future chased each other in and out of my head; or rather, it seems to me, dwelt there together.
"Daisy!" - papa called to me when I was on the roof one day. I ran down.
"What are you doing up there?"
"I was looking, papa. I was studying topography."
"Let us go out and study it a little by actual survey. I think a walk would do me good."
We went down first to the valley of the Kedron, and wandered about there; sometimes sitting down under the shade of the olive trees to rest; speculating upon localities, recalling scenes of history; wondering at the path which descends into the valley from St. Stephen's gate and goes on over the Mount of Olives to Bethany. Above all things, that path held my eyes. No doubt the real path that was travelled eighteen centuries ago lay deep beneath many feet of piled-up rubbish; but the rubbish itself told a tale; and the path was there. After a long stay in the valley, we mounted the hill again, where our temporary home was; and passing that, went on to the height of the hill. There we sat down. The westering sun was casting lines of light all over the landscape, which would be soon floods of colour. Papa and I sat down to look and wait.
"It certainly is worth coming for," said papa. "Our journey realises more than all I had hoped from it, Daisy."
"I am so glad, papa!"
"But you, Daisy, how is it with you? You seem to me a little, and not a little,distraite."
"I have so much to think of, papa."
"More than I have?"
"Why, yes, papa," I said, half laughing. "I think so."
"You must have fields of speculation unknown to me, Daisy."
"Yes, papa. Some time I want to talk to you about them."
"Isn't now a good time?" said papa, carelessly.
I was silent a while, thinking how to begin. It was a good time, I knew, and I dared not let it pass. I had been waiting till Mr. Dinwiddie should have left us and papa and I be quite alone; and he was to join us again as soon as we started on our northward journey. Now was my best opportunity. All the more, for knowing that, my heart beat.
"Papa," I began, "may I ask you a few questions, the better to come at what I want?"
"Certainly. Your questions, Daisy, I have always found stimulating."
"Then first, what is it you think of most, in looking over from this place to Jerusalem?"
"Of course," said papa, rousing himself, "the prominent thought must be the wonderful scene that was acted there eighteen hundred years ago; not the course of history before or after. Is that what you mean?"
"I mean that, papa. I mean the death of Christ. Papa, what was that for?"
"Why, as I understand it, Daisy, it was a satisfaction to the justice of God for the sins of the world. Are you going to put me through a course of theology, Daisy?"
"No, papa. But do you think it was for all the world, or only for a part of them?"
"For all, of course. The Bible words I take to be quite clear on that point, even if it were possible that it should have been otherwise."
"Then it was for you and me, papa?"
"Yes."
"And for those ignorant Moslems that live in the city now?"
"Yes, of course it was; though I think they will not have much good of it, Daisy."
"Never mind that, papa. Then it was for my old June, and for Maria and Darry and Pete and Margaret, and all the rest of our people at Magnolia?"
"Yes," said papa, rousing up a little. I did not look at him.
"Papa, don't you think the Lord Jesus loves the people for whom He died?"
"Certainly. It is inconceivable that He should have died for them if He did not love them. Though that is also a great mystery to me, Daisy."
"Papa, don't you think that, having died for them, He holds them precious?"
"I suppose so," said papa slowly.
"Every one?"
"Yes."
"Do you think He loves one man less than another because his skin is darker?"
"Certainly not, Daisy."
"Then papa - should we?"
"I do not know that we do," papa said, after a pause.
"Papa, think. What would you say to our, or anybody's, holding white men in slavery - making them work without wages - and forcing them to obey under the lash?"
"They are an inferior race, Daisy," papa answered again after a pause. His voice showed he did not enjoy the conversation; but it was needful for me to go on.
"Papa, they have been kept down. But suppose they were inferior, - since Christ died for them, does He not love them?"
"I have no doubt of it."
"Then, papa, what will He say to us, for keeping those whom He loves and died for, at arms' length or under our feet? and what will He say to us for keeping them out of the good He died to give them?"
"We do not, Daisy! They have their religious privileges."
"Papa, I have lived among them as you never did. They may not meet together to pray, on pain of the lash. They cannot have Bibles, for they are not allowed to read. They have no family life; for husbands and wives and parents and children are parted and torn from each other at the will or for the interest of their owners. They live like the animals."
"Not on my estates!" said papa, rousing himself again. "There is no selling and buying of the people there."
"Pete's wife was forcibly taken from him, papa, and then sentSouth."
"By whom?"
"By Edwards. And the rest of the hands were in mortal fear of him; utterly cowed. They dared not move without his pleasure."
"Abuses," papa muttered; - "nothing to do with the system."
"What must the system be where such things are possible? where one such thing is possible? And oh, papa, they suffer! there is no such thing as real comfort of life; there is no scope or liberty for the smallest upward tendency. Nothing is their own, not their own time; they have no chance to be anything but inferior."
"They have all the essentials of comfortable living, and they are comfortable," said my father.
"Papa, they do not think so."
"Few people do think so," said papa. "It is a vice of humanity."
I was silent a little bit, and then I ventured to say, -
"Papa, the Lord Jesus loved them well enough to die for them."
"Well," said papa, rather growlingly, "what then?"
"I am thinking, what will He say to us for handling them so."
"What would you do for them, Daisy?"
"All I could, papa," I said softly.
"How much could you, do you suppose?"
"Papa, I would not stop as long as there was anything more to be done."
"I suppose you would begin by setting them all free?"
"Wouldn't you wish it, papa, for yourself and me, if we were two of them? - and for mamma and Ransom, if they were two more?"
"You are mistaken in thinking it is a parallel case. They do not wish for liberty as we should."
"Then it only shows how much harm the want of liberty has done them already. But they wish for it quite enough, papa; quite enough. It breaks my heart to think how much they do wish for it."
"My child, you do not know what you are talking about!" papa answered; half worried, I thought, and half impatient. "In the first place, they would not be better off if they were set free; though you think they would; and in the second place, do you know how it would affect our own condition?"
"Papa," I said low, - "it has nothing to do with the question.I do not care."
"You would care."
"I care for this other more, papa."
"Daisy, understand. Instead of being well off, you would be poor; you would be poor. The Southern estates would be worth nothing without hands to cultivate them; and my Northern estates will go to your brother."
"I should never be rich in the way you think, papa."
"How so?"
"I would never be rich in that way."
"What would you do?"
"I would be poor."
"It is not so easy to do as to talk about," said my father."At the present time, Daisy, - I suppose, if you had yourwill, you would set at liberty at once all the people on theMagnolia plantations?"
"Indeed I would, papa."
"Then we should be reduced to a present nothing. The Melbourne property brings in very little, nothing, in fact, without a master on the spot to manage it. I dare say some trifling rent might be obtained for it; and the sale of Magnolia and its corresponding estates would fetch something if the times admitted of sale. You know it is impossible now. We should have scarce anything to live upon, my child, to satisfy your philanthropy."
"Papa, there was a poor woman once, who was reduced to a handful of meal and a little oil as her whole household store. Yet at the command of the prophet of the Lord, she took some of it to make bread for him, before she fed herself and her child - both of them starving. And the Lord never let her want either meal or oil all the time the famine lasted."
"Miracles do not come for people's help, now-a-days, Daisy."
"Papa, yes! God's ways may change, His ways of doing the same thing; but He does not change. He takes care of His people now without miracles, all the same."
"All the same!" repeated papa. "That is an English expression, that you have caught from your friends."
We were both silent for a while.
"Daisy, my child, your views of all these things will alter by and by. You are young, and have slight experience of the things of life. By and by, you will find it a much more serious thing than you imagine to be without wealth. You would find a great difference between the heiress and the penniless girl; a difference you would not like."
"Papa," I said slowly, - "I hope you will not be displeased or hurt, - but I want it to be known, and I wanted you should know, that I never shall be an heiress. I never will be rich in that way. I will take what God gives me."
"First throwing away what He has given you," said papa.
"I do not think He has given it, papa."
"What then? have we stolen it?"
"Not we; but those who have been before us, papa; they stole it. All we are doing, is keeping that which is not ours."
"Enough too, I should think!" said papa. "You will alter your mind, Daisy, about all this, if you wait a while. What do you think your mother would say to it?"
"I know, papa," I said softly. "But I cannot help thinking of what will be said somewhere else. I would like that you and I, and she too, might have that 'Well done' - which the Lord Jesus will give to some. And when they enter into the joy of their Lord, will they care what His service has cost them?"
My eyes were full of tears, and I could scarcely speak; for I felt that I had gained very little ground, or better no ground at all. What indeed could I have expected to gain? Papa sat still, and I looked over at Jerusalem, where the westing sun was making a bath of sunbeams for the old domes and walls. A sort of promise of glory, which yet touched me exceedingly from its contrast with present condition. Even so of other things, and other places besides Jerusalem. But Melbourne seemed to be in shadow. And Magnolia? -
I wondered what papa would say next, or whether our talk had come to a deadlock then and there. I had a great deal more myself to say; but the present opportunity seemed to be questionable. And then it was gone; for Mr. Dinwiddie mounted the hill and came to take a seat beside us.
"Any news, Mr. Dinwiddie?" was papa's question, as usual.
"From America."
"What sort of news?"
"Confused sort - as the custom is. Skirmishes which amount to nothing, and tell nothing. However, there is a little more this time. Fort Henry has been taken, on the Tennessee river, by Commander Foote and his gunboats."
"Successes cannot always be on one side, of course," remarked my father.
"Roanoke Island has been taken, by the sea and land forces under Burnside and Goldsborough."
"Has it!" - said papa. "Well, - what good will that do them?"
"Strengthen their hearts for continuing the struggle," saidMr. Dinwiddie. "It will do that."
"The struggle cannot last very long," said my father. "They must see sooner or later how hopeless it is."
"Not in the light of these last events," said Mr. Dinwiddie."What does my other friend here think about it?"
"About what, Mr. Dinwiddie?"
"The length of the struggle."
"Do you think Daisy has some special means of knowledge?" asked my father, carelessly.
"Well - yes," said Mr Dinwiddie. "She has been among Northern friends a good while; perhaps she can judge better of their tone and temper than I can, - or you, sir."
"I cannot hold just the view that you do, Mr. Dinwiddie, - or that papa does."
"So I supposed. You think there are some good soldiers in theNorthern army."
"It would be absurd to suppose there are not," said my father; "but what they do want, is a right understanding of the spirit of the South. It is more persistent and obstinate, as well as strong, than the North takes any account of. It will not yield. It will do and endure anything first."
I thought I had heard papa intimate a doubt on that issue; however I said nothing.
"Ifspiritwould save a people," Mr. Dinwiddie rejoined, "those walls over against us would not bear the testimony they do. No people ever fought with more spirit than this people. Yet Jerusalem is a heap of ruins."
"You do not mean that such a fate can overtake the wholeSouth?" said my father.
"I mean, that the race is not always to the swift. The South have right on their side, however."
"Right?" said I.
"I thought that would bring you out," Mr. Dinwiddie said, with a kindly look at me.
"Daisy is an abolitionist," said papa. "Where she got it, is out of my knowledge. But I think, Mr. Dinwiddie, there are minds so constituted that they take of choice that view of things which is practically the most adverse to their own interest."
"Tell papa, Mr. Dinwiddie, that that cannot be."
"What cannot be, if you please?"
"I mean, that which is therightcannot be the wrong in any sense; cannot be even the wrong view for anybody's interest that adopts it."
"Fair theories -" said papa.
"Something else, it must be, papa. There is a promise - 'With what measure ye measure, it shall be measured to you again.' 'Give, and it shall be given unto you; full measure, pressed down, heaped up, and running over, shall men give into your bosom.' "
"Why into my bosom?" said papa. "I would rather it were into my hands, or a basket, or anything."
We went off into a laugh upon that, and Mr. Dinwiddie explained, and the conversation turned. We went into the house to have tea; and there we discussed the subject of our further journey and when we should set off. Mr. Dinwiddie was engaged to go with us to Lebanon. But it was concluded that we would wait yet a little for the season to be further advanced. For me, I was in no hurry to leave the Mount of Olives and Jerusalem.
We sat on the roof that evening and watched the lights kindle in Jerusalem, and talked of the old-time scenes and changes; till I supposed the question of home troubles and our poor Magnolia people was pretty well driven from papa's mind. But when Mr. Dinwiddie was gone, and I was bidding him good-night, he held me fast in his arms, looking down into my face.
"Little Daisy!" - he said.
"Not just now, papa."
"The very same!" he said. "My little Daisy! - who was always forgetting herself in favour of any poor creature that came in her way."
"Papa - what did our Lord do?"
"Daisy, do you expect to conform yourself and everybody to that pattern?"
"Myself, papa. Not everybody."
"Me? -"
I could not answer papa. I hid my face on his breast; - for he still held me. And now he kissed me fondly.
"We must not do what mamma would never agree to," he said very kindly. Again I could make no answer. I knew all about mamma.
"Daisy," said papa presently, we had not changed our position, - "is Mr. Dinwiddie your friend, or mine?"
"Of us both, papa!" I said in astonishment. "Of me; particularly, perhaps; because he knows me best and has known me longest."
"Then he comes here to see you?"
"And you, papa."
"I am afraid he does not come to see me," papa said. "Do you like to see him very much, Daisy?"
"Certainly, papa; very much; because he is an old, old, very good friend. That is all."
"You are sure?"
"Quite sure, papa."
"I believe thatisall," said papa, looking into my face.
"I am afraid, however, that our friend wishes he were not quite so old a friend."
"No, papa," I said; "you are, mistaken. I am sure Mr.Dinwiddie does not think so. He knows better."
"How does he know better?"
"I think he understands, papa."
"What?"
"Me."
"What about you?"
"I think he thinks only that, - what I said, papa."
"And how came you to think he thinks anything about it?"
"Papa -"
"Has he ever told you his thoughts?"
"No, sir; certainly."
"Then what do you mean, Daisy."
"Papa - we have talked."
"But not about that?"
"No, papa; not about Mr. Dinwiddie's feelings, certainly. ButI am sure he understands."
"What, my pet?"
"My feelings, papa."
"Your feeling about himself?"
"Yes."
"How should he understand it, Daisy?"
"I think he does, papa -"
"You say, you 'have talked'? What course did your talk take?"
My heart beat. I saw what was coming now, - what ought to come. It was my time.
"It was a very general course, papa. It did not touch, directly, my feeling for Mr. Dinwiddie, or anybody."
"Indirectly?"
"I think - I do not know - I half fancied, Mr. Dinwiddie thought so."
"Thought what?"
"That it did touch some feeling of mine."
"Not for himself. For some other?"
"Yes -" I whispered.
"For whom?" he said abruptly. And then as I hesitated, -
"For one of those two?"
"What two?"
"De Saussure or Marshall?"
"Oh, no, papa!"
"Your cousin Gary?"
"Oh, no, papa!"
"Have I lost you, Daisy?" he said then in a different tone, gentle and lingering and full of regret. My breath was gone; I threw my arms around his neck.
"Why did you never tell me before, Daisy?"
"Papa, - I was afraid."
"Are you afraid now?"
"Yes."
"Let us have it over then, Daisy. Who is it that has stolen you from me?"
"Oh no one, papal" I cried. "No one could. No one can."
"Who has tried, then?"
"A great many people, papa; but not this person."
"How has it come to pass then, my pet? And who is this person?"
"Papa, it came to pass without anybody's knowing it or meaning it; and when I knew it, then I could not help it. But not what you say has come to pass; nobody has stolen or could steal me from you."
"I have only lost, without any other being the gainer," said papa a little bitterly.
"No, papa, you have not lost; you cannot; I am not changed, papa, do you not see that I am not changed? I am yours, just as I always was, - only more, papa."
Papa kissed me, but it cut me to the heart to feel there was pain in the kiss. I did what my lips could to clear the pain away.
"Half is not as much as the whole, Daisy," he said at length.
"It may be, papa. Suppose the whole is twice as large as it used to be?"
"That is a good specimen of woman's reasoning. But you have not told me all yet, Daisy. Who is it that holds the other half?"
There was so much soreness and disappointment shown in papa's words, rather in the manner of them, that it was extremely difficult for me to carry on the conversation. Tears are a help, I suppose, to other women. They do not come to me, not at such times. I stood still in papa's arms, with a kind of dry heartache. The pain in his words was a terrible trial to me. He folded me close again and kissed me over and over, and then whispered, -
"Who is it, Daisy?"
"Papa, it was at West Point. I never meant it, and never knew it, until I could not help it."
"At West Point!" said papa.
"Two years ago, when Dr. Sandford took me there."
"It is not Dr. Sandford!"
"Oh, no, papa! He is not to blame. He did everything he could to take care of me. He knows nothing it all about it."
"Who is it, then?"
"He was a cadet then, papa; he is in the army now."
"Who is he?"
"He is from Vermont; his name is Thorold."
"Not a Southerner?"
"No, papa. Do you care very much for that?"
"Is he in theNorthernarmy, Daisy?"
"He could not help that, papa; being a Vermonter."
Papa let me go; I had been standing in his arms all this while; and took several turns up and down our little room. I sat down, for my joints trembled under me. Papa walked and walked.
"Does your mother know?" he said at last.
"I dared not tell her."
"Who does know?"
"Nobody, papa, but you, and an old friend of mine in New York, - an aunt of Mr. Thorold's."
"Daisy, what is this young man?"
"Papa, I wish you could know him."
"How comes it that he, as well as you, has kept silence?"
"I don't know, papa. His letter must have miscarried. He was going to write to you immediately, just before I left Washington. I was afraid to have him do it, but he insisted that he must."
"Why were you afraid?"
"Papa, I knew you and mamma would not be I pleased; that it would not be what you would wish; and I feared mamma, and perhaps you, would forbid him at once."
"Does he write to you?"
"I would not let him, papa, without your permission; and I was afraid I could not get that."
"What did you expect to do then, Daisy, if I was never to be told?"
"I thought to wait only till the war should be over, papa, - when he might see you himself and you might see him. I thought that would be the best way."
"Hedid not?"
"No; he insisted on writing."
"He was right. What is the young man's name, Daisy? you have not told me yet."
"Christian Thorold."
"Thorold," said papa. "It is an English name. Have you heard nothing from him, Daisy, since you came to Switzerland?"
"Nothing," - I said.
Papa came over again to where I sat on the divan, bent down and kissed me.
"Am I such a terror to you, Daisy?"
"Oh, no, papa," I said, bursting into tears at last; - "but mamma - you know if mamma said a word at first, she would never go back from it."
"I know," he said. "And I choose, for the present, that this matter should remain a secret between you and me. You need not tell your mother until I bid you."
"Yes, papa. Thank you."
"And, Daisy," said he stroking my hair fondly, - "the war is not ended in America yet, and I am afraid we have a long time to wait for it. Poor child! - But for the present there are no storms ahead."
I rose up and kissed papa, with a very tender good-night given and exchanged; and then I went to my room. The Jerusalem lights were out. But a peace, deep and wide as the blue arch of the sky, seemed to have spanned my life and my heart.
There was an immense burden lifted off me. It is difficult to express the change and the relief in my feelings. The next day was given to an excursion in the neighbourhood; and I never can forget how rare the air seemed to be, as if I were breathing pure life; and how brilliant the sunlight was that fell on the wonderful Palestine carpet of spring flowers. All over they were; under foot and everywhere else; flashing from hidden places, peeping round corners, smiling at us in every meadow and hillside; a glory upon the land. Papa was in great delight, as well as I; and as kind as possible to me; also very good to Mr. Dinwiddie. Mr. Dinwiddie himself seemed to me transformed. I had gone back now to the free feeling of a child; and he looked to me again as my childish eyes had seen him. There was a great amount of fire and vigour and intellectual life in his countenance; the auburn hair and the brown eyes glowed together with the hue of a warm temperament; but that was tempered by a sweet and manly character. I thought he had grown soberer than the Mr. Dinwiddie of my remembrance.
That particular day lies in my memory like some far-off lake that one has seen just under the horizon of a wide landscape, - a still bit of silvery light. It is not the distance, though, in this case, that gives it its shining. We were going that morning to visit Gibeon and Neby Samwil; and the landscape was full, for me, of the peace which had come into the relations between me and papa. It was a delicious spring day; the flowers bursting under our feet with their fresh smiles; the air perfumed with herby scents and young sweetness of nature; while associations of old time clustered all about, like sighs of history. - We went first along the great stony track which leads from Jerusalem to the north; then turned aside into the great route from Jaffa to Jerusalem; not the southern and rougher way which re had taken when we came from the coast. This was he approach of almost all the armies which have poured their fury on the devoted city. We went single file, as one has to go in Palestine; and I liked it. There was too much to think of to make one want to talk. And the buoyancy of the air seemed to feed mind as well as body, and give all the stimulus needed. Mr. Dinwiddie sometimes called out to me to point my attention to something; and the rest of the time I kept company with the past and my own musings.
We visited Gibeon first, and stood by the dry pool where Abner and Joab watched the fight of their twelve picked men; and we read Solomon's prayer.
"This is a wonderful country," said papa, "for the way its associations are packed. There is more history here than in any other region of the world."
"Well, papa, it is the world's history," I said.
"What do you mean, Daisy?"
I hesitated; it was not very easy to tell.
"She is right though," said Mr. Dinwiddie; "it is the very core of the world's history, round which the other is slowly gathering and maturing, to the perfected fruit. Or to take it another way, - ever since God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take put of them a people for His name, His dealings with that people have been an earnest and an image of His course with His Church at large. We may cut down to the heart of the world and find the perfect flower here - as we do in bulbs."
"A blossoming to destruction then, it seems," said my father.
"No!" said Mr. Dinwiddie - "to restoration and glory. The history of this land is not yet finished."
"And you thinkthatis in store for it yet?"
Mr. Dinwiddie answered, - " 'Thus saith the Lord; If ye can break my covenant of the day, and my covenant of the night, and that there should not be day and night in their season; then may also my covenant be broken with David my servant, that he should not have a son to reign upon his throne; and with the Levites the priests, my ministers. As the hosts of heaven cannot be numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured: so will I multiply the seed of David my servant, and the Levites that minister unto me.' "
"Who spoke that?"
"The prophet Jeremiah."
"And when, pray?"
"When Nebuchadnezzar and his army were just upon the point of completing the destruction of the city - and of the people."
"Then it refers to their return from captivity, does it not?"
"As the type of the other restoration," said Mr. Dinwiddie. "For 'In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land. In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely; and this is the name whereby she shall be called, The Lord our righteousness.' Moreover, in Ezekiel's vision of a new temple and city, he gives the dimensions of the temple large enough to take in all Jerusalem, and the holy city as many times exceeding its utmost actual limits; and he says, 'The name of the city from that day shall be, The Lord is there.' Jehovah shammah. I wish the day were come."
"You take it as entirely figurative!" said papa. "I thought just now you made it entirely literal."
"What is a figure?" said Mr. Dinwiddie. "And if you take away the literal, where will the spiritual be?"
"True," said papa. "These are things I have not studied."
And then we mounted to the height of Neby Samwil and sat down for a good long look. Mr. Dinwiddie was here as elsewhere invaluable. He told us everything and pointed out everything to us, that we ought to see or know. The seacoast plain lay below; - spread out for many a mile, with here a height and there a cluster of buildings, and the blue sea washing its western border. We could easily see Jaffa, Ramleh and Lydda; we picked those spots out first which we knew. Then Mr. Dinwiddie pointed us to Ashdod, and to Ekron, a little to the left of Ramleh.
"And that is where Nebuchadnezzar was with his army, before he went up to Jerusalem," I said.
"The first time," said Mr. Dinwiddie. "Yes; there his hosts of Chaldeans lay in the plain; and there after the place was taken he impaled the chiefs of the town; and then flushed with power, came up to Jerusalem and cast banks against it. So he says; and we know that so Isaiah prophesied he would do; and we know that Hezekiah bought him off."
"Did he come up this way of the Beth-horons?" I asked.
"I suppose so. And down this way, Joshua chased the fleeing kings and their followers and overthrew them as they fled down the pass - what a rush it must have been! - and down there, down where the green sweeps into the hills from the plain, there is Ajalon."
"Papa, do you see?"
"I see; but I do not understand quite so well as you do,Daisy, what you are talking about."
"It is Miss Randolph's own country," remarked Mr. Dinwiddie.
"She is not a Jewess," said papa.
"Pardon me - we have it on authority that 'he is a Jew which is one inwardly;' - an Israelite indeed," Mr . Dinwiddie muttered to himself.
I saw papa was puzzled and half displeased. I hastened to turn the conversation, and showed him where Bethel lay and the mountains of Ephraim; and finally ordered our luncheon basket to be brought forward. But we had to leave our position and choose a shaded place, the sun was growing so hot.
"How long do you expect to remain here - in Palestine, Mr. Dinwiddie?" something prompted me to ask. He hesitated a moment or two and then replied -
"I cannot tell - probably as long as I stay anywhere on this scene of action."
"You do not mean ever to come home?" I said.
"What is 'home,' Miss Daisy?" he replied, looking at me.
"It is where we were born," said papa.
"Would your daughter say so?"
"No," I answered; for I was born at Magnolia. "But I think home is where we have lived, - is it not?"
"Melbourne?" Mr. Dinwiddie suggested.
"No," said I; "it is not Melbourne now, to be sure; but neither could it be possibly any place in Europe, or Asia."
"Are you sure? Not inanycircumstances?"
I cannot tell what, in his tone or look, drove his meaning home. But I felt the colour rise in my face and I could not answer.
"It is where the heart is, after all," Mr. Dinwiddie resumed. "The Syrian sky does not make much difference.Myhome is waiting for me."
"But we speak of home here, and properly."
"Properly, for those who have it."
"I think, Mr. Dinwiddie, that we say 'home' sometimes, when we speak only of where the heart was."
"Better not," he said. "Let us have a living home, not a dead one. And that we can, always."
"What do you know of places where the heartwas?" said papa, looking at me curiously.
"Not much, papa; but I was thinking; and I think people mean that sometimes."
"We will both trust she will never come nearer to the knowledge," said Mr. Dinwiddie, with one of his bright looks at papa and at me. It was assuming a little more interest in our affairs than I feared papa would like; but he took it quietly. More quietly than I could, though my reason for disquietude was different. Mr. Dinwiddie's words had set vibrating a chord in my heart which could not just then give a note of pleasure. I wanted it to lie still. The wide fair landscape took a look to me instantly, which indeed belonged to it, of "places where the heart was;" and the echo of broken hopes came up to my ear from the gray ruins near and far. Yet the flowers of spring were laughing and shouting under my feet. Was it hope, or mockery?
"What are you questioning, Miss Daisy ?" said Mr. Dinwiddie, as he offered me some fruit.
"I seemed to hear two voices in nature, Mr. Dinwiddie; - I wanted to find out which was the true."
"What were the voices? - and I will tell you."
"One came from the old heap of Ekron yonder, and the ruins of Ramleh, and Jerusalem, and Gibeon, and Bethel; - the other voice came from the flowers."
"Trust the flowers."
"Why, more than the ruins?"
"Remember," - said he. "One is God's truth; the other is man's falsehood."
"But the ruins tell truth too, Mr. Dinwiddie."
"What truth? They tell of man's faithlessness, perversity, wrongheadedness, disobedience; persisted in, till there was no remedy. And now, to be sure, they are a desolation. But that is not what God willed for the land."
"Yet surely, Mr. Dinwiddie, there come desolations into people's lives too."
"By the same reason."
"Surely without it sometimes."
"Nay," he said. " 'The Lord redeemeth the soul of His servants; and none of them that trust in Him shall be desolate.' "
"But their lives are empty sometimes?"
"That they may be more full, then. Depend on it, the promise is sure, - they shall not want any good I thing."
"One must let the Lord judge then," I said somewhat sorrowfully, "what are the good things."
"Will we not?" said Mr. Dinwiddie. "Do we know? We must agree to his judgment, too; and then we shall find there is no want to them that fear him. The Lord is my Shepherd! - I shall not want. But the sheep follow the shepherd, and never dream of choosing out their own pasture, Miss Daisy."
My voice choked a little and I could not answer. And all the rest of the day I could not get back my quiet. The talk of leaving the choice of my life out of my own hands, had roused my hands to cling to their choice with a terrible grasp lest it should be taken away from them. The idea that Thorold and I might be parted from each other, made my heart leap out with inexpressible longing to be with him. It was not till we got home to the Mount of Olives again, and I was watching the glory of the sunset, turning Jerusalem to gold and bringing out rosy and purple and amethyst hues from the Moab mountains, that my heart leapt back to its rest and I heard the voice of nature and God again above the din of my own heart.
As soon as the season was far enough advanced, and Mr. Dinwiddie could make his arrangements to be with us, we left Jerusalem and its surroundings and set off northwards. It was hard to go. Where many a sorrowful traveller has left his little mound of farewell stones on Scopus, I stood and looked back; as long as papa would wait for me. Jerusalem looked so fair, and the thought and prospect of another Jerusalem lay before me, fairer indeed, but so distant. And I fancied storms and some rough travelling between. And here, in the actual Jerusalem, my life had been very sweet; peaceful with a whole flood tide of peacefulness. I resolved I would not lose nor forget this ungratefully; but as long as I could I would be happy. So I turned my face at last to enjoy every foot of the way to Nablous.
During our stay at Jerusalem and on the Mount of Olives, of course letters and papers had been received regularly; and sometimes a bit of news from America had made all our hearts stir. Mine, with a new throb of hope and possible exultation; for what we heard was on the side of Northern successes. Still, papa and Mr. Dinwiddie agreed these were but the fortune of war, and could not - in the nature of things last. The South could not be overcome. So they said, and I feared. But a thrill of possible doubt came over me when I heard of Fort Donelson, and the battle of Pea Ridge, and the prowess of the little iron-cladMonitor. And a great throb of another kind heaved my heart, when we got the news of President Lincoln's Message, recommending that assistance should be given by Congress to every Southern State which would abolish slavery. A light broke in upon the whole struggle; and from that time the war was a different thing to me. Papa and Mr. Dinwiddie talked a great deal about it, discussing the subject in almost all its bearings. I sat by and said nothing.
I would not read the papers myself, all this time. In America I had studied them, and in Switzerland and in Florence I had devoured them. Here in the Holy Land, I had made an agreement with myself to be happy; to leave the care of things which I could not manage, and not to concern myself with the fluctuations on the face of affairs which I could not trace out to their consequences, do what I would. So. I heard the principal points of news from papa's talk and Mr. Dinwiddie's; I let the papers alone. Only with one exception. I could not help it. I could not withhold myself from looking at the lists of wounded and killed. I looked at nothing more; but the thought that one name might be there would have incessantly haunted me, if I had not made sure that it was not there. I dreaded every arrival from the steamers of a new mail budget.
From Mr. Thorold I got no letter. Nor from Miss Cardigan. From Mrs. Sandford one; which told me nothing I wanted to know. To mamma papa had writ- ten, describing to her the pleasure we were enjoying and the benefit his health was deriving from our journey, and asking her to join us at Beyrout and spend the summer on Lebanon.
Towards Beyrout we now journeyed gently on; stopping and lingering by the way as our custom was. At Nablous, at Nazareth, at Tiberias, at Safed, at Banias; then across the country to Sidon, down to Khaiffa and Carmel; finally we went up to Beyrout. Papa enjoyed every bit of the way; to me it was a journey scarcely of this earth, the happiness of it was so great. Mr. Dinwiddie everywhere our kind and skilful guide, counsellor, helper; knowing all the ground, and teaching us to use our time to the very best advantage. He made papa more at ease about me, and me about papa.
At Beyrout, for the first time since we left Jerusalem, we found ourselves again in a hotel. Mr. Dinwiddie went to find our despatches that were awaiting us. Papa lay down on the cushions of a divan. I sat at the window, wondering at what I saw. I wonder now at the remembrance.
It was afternoon, and the shades and colours on the mountains and the sea were a labyrinth of delight. Yes, the eye and the mind lost themselves again and again, to start back again to the consciousness of an enchanted existence. The mountains rising from the coast were in full view of my window, shaded with all sorts of green from the different woods and cultivation which clothed their sides. The eye followed their growing heights and ridges, till it rested on the snow summit of Sunnin; then swept round the range to the southward; but ever came back again to the lofty, reposeful majesty of that white mountain top in the blue ether. Little streams I could see dashing down the rocks; a white thread amongst the green; castles or buildings of some stately sort were upon every crag; I found afterwards they were monasteries. The sea waves breaking on the rocks of the shore gave other touches of white, and the sea was taking a deep hue, and the town stretching back from it looked gay and bright, with pretty houses and palm trees and palaces, and, bright-coloured dresses flitting here and there in the streets; and white sails were on the sea. I had never seen, I have never seen, anything more lovely than Beyrout. I had come to the city rather anxious; for we expected there to meet a great budget of news, which I always dreaded; wandering about from place to place, we had been blissfully separated for some time from all disturbing intelligence. Now we must meet it, perhaps; but the glory of the beauty before me wrapped my heart round as with an unearthly shield. Peace, peace, and good will, - it spoke, from Him who made the beauty and owned the glory; softly it reminded me that my Father in heaven could not fail in love nor in resources. I leaned my head against the frame of the open window, and rested and was glad.
Mr. Dinwiddie came back with a business step. I looked up, but I would not fear. He laid a pile of letters and papers before papa, and then sat down to the consideration of some of his own.
"What is doing at home, Dinwiddie?" papa asked.
"A good deal, since our last advices."
"What? I am tired of reading about it."
"Yes," said Mr. Dinwiddie. "You want me to save you the trouble?"
"If it is no trouble to you."
"The news is of several advantages gained by the Yankees."
"That won't last," said papa. "But there are always fluctuations in these things."
"Back in March," Mr. Dinwiddie went on, "there are reported two engagements in which our troops came off second best - at Newhern and at Winchester. It is difficult perhaps to know the exact truth - the papers on the two sides hold such different language. But the sixth of April there was a furious battle at Pittsburg Landing, our men headed by Beauregard, Polk and Sidney Johnston, when our men got the better very decidedly; the next day came up a sweeping reinforcement of the enemy under Grant and others, and took back the fortune of war into their own hands, it seems."
"Perhaps that is doubtful too," observed my father.
"I see Beauregard asked permission to bury his dead."
"Many killed?" asked my father.
"Terribly many. There were large numbers engaged, and fierce fighting."
So theycando it, I said to myself, amid all my heart- beating.
"There will be of course, some variation of success," said my father.
"The pendulum is swung all to one side, in these last news," said Mr. Dinwiddie.
"What next?"
"Fort Pulaski is taken."
"Pulaski!" my father exclaimed.
"Handsomely done, after a bombardment of thirty hours."
"I am surprised, I confess," said papa.
"The House of Representatives has passed a bill for the abolition of slavery in the District."
"Oh, I am glad!" I exclaimed. "Thatis good."
"Is thatallyou think good in the news?" said Mr. Dinwiddie a little pointedly.
"Daisy is a rebel," said papa.
"No, papa; notIsurely. I stand by the President and theCountry."
"Thenweare rebels, Dinwiddie," said papa, half wearily. "Half the country is playing the fool, that is clear; and the whole must suffer."
"But the half where the seat of war is, suffers the most."
"That will not last," said papa. "I know the South."
"I wonder if we know the North," said Mr. Dinwiddie. "Farragut has run the gauntlet of the forts at the mouth of the Mississippi and taken New Orleans."
"Taken New Orleans!" my father exclaimed again, rising half up as he lay on the cushions of the divan.
"It was done in style," said Mr. Dinwiddie, looking along the columns of his paper. "Let me read you this, Mr. Randolph."
Papa assented, and he read; while I turned my face to the window again, and listened to Farragut's guns and looked at Lebanon. What a strange hour it was! There was hope at work and rejoicing; but it shook me. And the calmness of the everlasting hills and the mingled sweetnesses of the air, came in upon the fever of my heart with cooling and quieting power. The sea grew a deeper blue as I listened and looked; the mountains - what words can tell the mantle of their own purple that enfolded them as the evening came on; and the snowy heights of Sunnin and Kunisyeh grew rosy. I looked and I drank it in; and I could not fear for the future.
I believe I had fallen into a great reverie, during which Mr. Dinwiddie ended his reading and left the room. It was papa's touch on my shoulder that roused me. He had come to my side.
"Are you happy, Daisy?" was his question.
"Papa? -" I said in bewilderment.
"Your face was as calm as if you had nothing to think about."
"I had been thinking, papa. I was thinking, I believe."
"Does this strange news make you happy?"
"Oh, no, papa; not that."
"What then?"
"Something that is no news, and that never can grow old, papa.The mountains and the sea were just reminding me of it."
"You mean - what? You speak riddles, Daisy."
"Papa, you would give me everything good for me, if you could."
He kissed me fondly.
"I would, my child. Whether I can, or no, that troubles me by its uncertainty."
"Papa, my Father in heaven can, and will. There is no doubt about His power. And so there is no uncertainty."
"Daisy! -" said papa, looking at me in a strange way.
"Yes, papa, I mean it. Papa, you know it is true."
"I know you deserve all I can give you," he said, taking my face in his two hands and looking into it. "Daisy - is there anybody in the world that loves you as well as I do?"
That was a little too much, to bring up my heart in words in that manner. In spite of my composure, which I thought so strong, I was very near bursting into tears. I believe my face flushed and then grew pale with the struggle. Papa took me in his arms.
"You shall have no trouble that I can shield you from," he said tenderly. "I will put nothing between you and this young man if he is worthy of you, Daisy. I will pat nothing. But others may. My power reaches only a certain distance."
"Papa -" I began, but I could not say what I would.
"Well?3 - said he tenderly, stroking my hair, "what is it? I would keep all trouble from you, my pet, if I could."
"Papa," I whispered, "that may not be best. We must leave that. But papa, if you only knew what I know and were glad as I am glad, - I think I could bear all the rest!"
"How shall I be glad as you are glad, Daisy?" he said, half sadly.
"Papa, let Jesus make you happy!"
"You are talking Hebrew, my child."
"No, papa; for if you seek Him, Hewillmake you happy."
"Come! we will seek him from to-day," my father said.
And that was my summer on Lebanon. My mother wrote that she would not join us in Syria; she preferred to remain in Paris, where she had my aunt Gary's company and could receive the American news regularly. Her words were bitter and scornful about the successes of the Northern army and McClellan's fruitless siege of Yorktown; so bitter, that papa and I passed them over without a word of comment, knowing how they bore on my possible future.
But we, we studied the Bible, and we lived on Lebanon. And when I have said that, I have said all. From one village to another, higher and higher up, we went; pitching our tents under the grand old walnut trees, within sight or hearing of mountain torrents that made witcheries of beauty in the deep ravines; studying sunrisings, when the light came over the mountain's brow and lit our broken hillside by degrees, our walnut tree tops and the thread of the rushing stream; and sunsets, when the sun looked at us from the far-off Mediterranean and touched no spot of Lebanon but to make a glorified place of it. With Mr. Dinwiddie we took rides to different scenes of wonder and beauty; made excursions sometimes of a week or two long; we dreamed at Baalbec and rejoiced under the Cedars. Everywhere papa and I read the Bible. Mr. Dinwiddie left us for some time during the summer, and returned again a few days before we left Lebanon and Syria.
"So you are going to-morrow" - he said the last evening, as he and I were watching the sunset from the edge of the ravine which bordered our camping-ground. I made no answer, for my heart was too full.
"It has been a good summer," he said. I bowed my head in assent.
"And now," he said, "you push out into the world again. I feel about you as I did when I saw your little craft just starting forth, and knew there were breakers ahead."
"You do not know that now, Mr. Dinwiddie?" I said.
"I know there are rocks. If the sea should let you pass them in quiet, it would be a wonder."
That was too true, I knew. I could only be silent.
"How do you feel?" he next asked.
"I know it is as you say, Mr. Dinwiddie."
"And in view of it? -"
"What can I do, - Mr. Dinwiddie?"
"Nothing to avoid the rocks. The helm is not in your hand."
"But I know in whose hand it is."
"And are willing to have it there?"
"More than willing," I said, meeting his eye.
"Then the boat will go right," he said, with a sort of accent of relief. "It is the cross pulls with the oar, striving to undo the work of the rudder, that draw the vessel out of her course. The Pilot knows, - if you can only leave it to the Pilot."
There was a pause again.
"But He sometimes takes the boat into the breakers," Mr.Dinwiddie said.
"Yes," I said. "I know it."
"What then, Daisy, my friend?"
"What then, Mr. Dinwiddie?" I said, looking up at him. "Then she must be broken to pieces."