"The Linwoods!" said Richard, glancing merrily at the tin pail, which shone so conspicuously bright in the sunshine. "You must have heard of them?"
"Never."
"Not heard of the new-comers! Haven't you heard that Mrs. Linwood has purchased the famous old Grandison Place, that has stood so long in solitary grandeur, had it fitted up in modern style, and taken possession of it for a country residence? Is it possible that you are such a little nun, that you have heard nothing of this?"
"I go nowhere; no one comes to see us; I might as well be a nun."
"But at school?"
"I have not been since last autumn. But that fair, beautiful young lady, is she a daughter of Mrs. Linwood?"
"She is,—Edith Linwood. Rather a romantic name, is it not? Do you think her beautiful?"
"The loveliest creature I ever looked upon. I should be quite miserable if I thought I never should look upon her again. And you know her,—she bowed to you. How sorry I am she should see you performing such an humble office for a little rustic like me!"
"She will think none the worse of me for it. If she did, I should despise her. But she is no heartless belle,—Edith Linwood is not. She is an angel of goodness and sweetness, if all they say of her be true. I do not know her very well. She has a brother with whom I am slightly acquainted, and through him I have been introduced into the family. Mrs. Linwood is a noble, excellent woman,—I wish you knew her. I wish you knew Edith,—I wish you knew them all. They would appreciate you. I am sure they would."
"Iknow them!" I exclaimed, glancing at our lowly cottage, my simple dress, and contrasting them mentally with the lordly dwelling and costly apparel of these favorites of nature and of fortune. "They appreciateme!"
"I suppose you think Edith Linwood the most enviable of human beings. Rich, lovely, with the power of gratifying every wish, and of dispensing every good, she would gladly exchange this moment with you, and dip water from yon bubbling spring."
"Impossible!" I cried. "How can she help being happy?"
"She does seem happy, but she is lame, and her health is very delicate. She cannot walk one step without crutches, on which she swings herself along very lightly and gracefully, it is true; but think you not she would not give all her wealth to be able to walk with your bounding steps, and have your elastic frame?"
"Crutches!" said I, sorrowfully, "why she looked as if she might have wings on her shoulders. Itissad."
"She is not an object of pity. You will not think she is when you know her. I only wanted to convince you, that you might be an object of envy to one who seems so enviable to you."
I would gladly have lingered where I was, within the sound of Richard Clyde's frank and cheerful voice, but I thought of poor Peggy thirsting for a cooling draught, and my conscience smote me for being a laggard in my duty. It is true, the scene, which may seem long in description, passed in a very brief space of time, and though Richard said a good many things, he talked very fast, without seeming hurried either.
"I shall see you again at the spring," said he, as he turned from the gate. "You must consider me as the Aquarius of your domestic Zodiac. I should like to be my father's camel-driver, if that were Jacob's well."
I could not help smiling at his gay nonsense,—his presence had been so brightening, so comforting. I had gone down to the spring sad and desponding. I returned with a countenance so lighted up, a color so heightened, that my mother looked at me with surprise.
As soon as I had ministered to Peggy, who seemed mortified and ashamed because of her sickness, and distressed beyond measure at being waited upon. I told my mother of my interview with Richard, of his kindness in carrying the water, the vision of the splendid carriage, of its beautiful occupants, the fitting up of the old Grandison Place, and all that Richard had related to me.
She listened with a troubled countenance. "Surely, young Clyde will not be so inconsiderate, so officious, as to induce those ladies to visit us?"
"No, indeed, mother. He is not officious. He knows you would not like to see them. He would not think of such a thing."
"No, no," I repeated to myself, as I exerted myself bravely in my new offices, as nurse and housekeeper, "there is no danger of that fair creature seeking out this little obscure spot. She will probably ask Richard Clyde who the little country girl was, whose water-pail he was so gallantly carrying, and I know he will speak kindly of me, though he will laugh at being caught in such an awkward predicament. Perhaps to amuse her, he will tell her of my flight from the academy and the scenes which resulted, and she will ask him to show her the poem, rendered so immortal. Then merrily will her silver laughter ring through the lofty hall. I have wandered all over Grandison Place when it was a deserted mansion. No one saw me, for it is far back from the street, all embosomed in shade, and it reminded me of some old castle with its turreted roof and winding galleries. I wonder how it looks now." I was falling into one of my old-fashioned dreams, when a moan from Peggy wakened me, and I sprang to her bedside with renewed alarm.
Yes, Peggy was very sick; but she would not acknowledge it. It was nothing but a violent headache,—a sudden cold; she would be up and doing in the morning. The doctor! No, indeed, she would have nothing to do with doctors. She had never taken a dose of medicine in her life, and never would, of her own freewill. Sage tea was worth all the pills and nostrums in the world. On the faith of her repeated assertions, that she felt a great deal better and would be quite well in the morning, we slept, my mother and myself, leaving the lamp dimly burning by the solemn hour-glass.
About midnight we were awakened by the wild ravings of delirious agony,—those sounds so fearful in themselves, so awful in the silence and darkness of night, so indescribably awful in the solitude of our lonely dwelling.
Peggy had struggled with disease like "the strong man prepared to run a race," but it had now seized her with giant grasp, and she lay helpless and writhing, with the fiery fluid burning in her veins, sending dark, red flashes to her cheeks and brow. Her eyes had a fierce, lurid glare, and she tossed her head from side to side on the pillow with the wild restlessness of an imprisoned animal.
"Good God!" cried my mother, looking as white as the sheets, and trembling all over as in an ague-fit. "What shall we do? She will die unless a doctor can see her. Oh, my child, what can we do? It is dreadful to be alone in the woods, when sickness and death are in the house."
"Iwill go for the doctor, mother, if you are not afraid to stay alone with Peggy," cried I, in hurried accents, wrapping a shawl round me as I spoke.
My mother wrung her hands.
"Oh! this is terrible," she exclaimed. "How dim and dark it looks abroad. I cannot let you go alone, at midnight. It cannot be less than a mile to Dr. Harlowe's. No, no; I cannot let you go."
"And Peggy must die, then.Shemust die who has served us so faithfully, and lived alone for us! Oh, mother, let me go I will fly on the wings of the wind. You will hardly miss me before I return. I am not afraid of the darkness. I am not afraid of the lonely woods. I only fear leaving you alone with her."
"Go," said my mother, in a faint voice. "God will protect you. I feel that He will, my good, brave Gabriella."
I kissed her white cheek with passionate tenderness, cast a glance of anguish on Peggy's fearfully altered face, then ran out into the chill, dark midnight. At first I could scarcely discern the sandy path I had so often trodden, for no moon lighted up the gloom of the hour, and even the stars glimmered faintly through a grey and cloudy atmosphere. As I hurried along, the wind came sighing through the trees with such inexpressible sadness, it seemed whispering mournfully of the dark secrets of nature. Then it deepened into a dull, roaring sound, like the murmurs of the ocean tide; but even as I went on the melancholy wind pursued me like an invisible spirit, winding around me its chill, embracing arms.
I seemed the only living thing in the cold, illimitable night. A thick horror brooded over me. The sky was a mighty pall, sweeping down with heavy cloud-fringes, the earth a wide grave. I did not fear, that is, I feared not man, or beast or ghost, but an unspeakable awe and dread was upon me. I dreaded the great God, whose presence filled with insupportable grandeur the lonely night. My heart was hard as granite.Icould not have prayed, had I known that Peggy's life would be given in answer to my prayer. I could not say, "Our Father, who art in heaven," as I had so often done at my mother's knee, in the sweet, childlike spirit of filial love and submission. My Father's face was hidden, and behind the thick clouds of darkness I saw a stern, vindictive Being, to whom the smoke of human suffering was more acceptable than frankincense and myrrh.
I compared myself wandering alone in darkness and sorrow, on such an awful errand, to the fair, smiling being cradled in wealth, then doubtless sleeping in her bed of down, watched by attending menials. Oh! rebel that I was, did I not need the chastening discipline, never exerted but in wisdom and in love?
Before I knew it, I was at Dr. Harlowe's door. All was dark and still. The house was of brick, and it loomed up gloriously as I approached. It seemed to frown repulsively with its beetling eaves, as I lifted the knocker and let it fall with startling force. In a moment I heard footsteps moving and saw a light glimmering through the blinds. He was at home, then,—I had accomplished my mission. It was no matter if I died, since Peggy might be saved. I really thought I was going to die, I felt so dull and faint and breathless. I sunk down on the stone steps, just as the door was opened by Dr. Harlowe himself, whom I had seen, but never addressed before. Placing his left hand above his eyes, he looked out, in search of the messenger who had roused him from his slumber. I tried to rise, but was too much exhausted. I could scarcely make my errand understood. I had run a mile without stopping, and now Ihadstopped, my limbs seemed turned into lead and my head to ice.
"My poor child!" said the doctor, in the kindest manner imaginable. "You should not have come yourself at this hour. It was hardly safe. Why,—you have run yourself completely out of breath. Come in, while they are putting my horse in the buggy. I must giveyousome medicine before we start."
He stooped down and almost lifted me from the step where I was seated, and led me into what appeared to me quite a sumptuous apartment, being handsomely carpeted and having long crimson curtains to the windows. He made me sit down on a sofa, while he went to a closet, and pouring out a generous glass of wine, insisted upon my drinking it. I obeyed him mechanically, for life seemed glowing in the ruddy fluid. It was. It came back in warmth to my chilled and sinking heart. I felt it stealing like a gentle fire through my whole system,—burning gently, steadily on my cheek, and kindling into light my heavy and tear-dimmed eyes. It was the first glass I had ever tasted, and it ran like electricity through my veins. Had the doctor been aware of my previous abstinence, he might not have thought it safe to have offered me the brimming glass. Had I reflected one moment I should have swallowed it less eagerly; but I seemed sinking, sinking into annihilation, when its reviving warmth restored me. I felt as if I had wings, and could fly over the dreary space my weary feet had so lately overcome.
"You feel better, my dear," said the doctor, with a benevolent smile, as he watched the effect of his prescription. "You must not make so dangerous an experiment again as running such a distance at this time of night. Peggy's life is very precious, I dare say, and so is yours. Are you ready to ride? My buggy is not very large, but I think it will accommodate us both. We will see."
Though it was the first time I had ever spoken with Dr. Harlowe, I felt as much confidence in his kindness and benevolence as if I had known him for years. There was something so frank and genial about him, he seemed, like the wine I had been quaffing, warming to the heart. There was barely room for me, slender as I was, for the carriage was constructed for the accommodation of the doctor alone; but I did not feel embarrassed, or as if I were intruding. He drove very rapidly, conversing the whole time in a pleasant, cheering voice.
"Peggy must be a very valuable person," he said, "for you to venture out so bravely in her cause. We must cure her, by all means."
I expatiated on her virtues with all the eloquence of gratitude. Something must have emboldened my shy tongue,—something more than the hope, born of the doctor's heart-reviving words.
"He is come—he is come," I exclaimed, springing from the buggy to the threshold, with the quickness of lightning.
Oh! how dim and sickly and sad every thing appeared in that little chamber! I turned and looked at the doctor, wondering if he had ever entered one so sad before. Peggy lay in an uneasy slumber, her arms thrown above her head, in a wild, uncomfortable attitude. My mother sat leaning against the head of the bed, pale and statue-like, with her hand, white as marble, partly hidden in her dark and loosely braided hair. The doctor glanced at the bed, then at my mother, and his glance riveted on her. Surprise warmed into admiration,—admiration stood checked by reverence. He advanced a few steps into the room, and made her as lowly a bow as if she were an empress. She rose without speaking and motioned me to hand him a chair; but waiving the offered civility, he went up to the side of the bed and laid his fingers quietly on the pulse of his patient. He stood gravely counting the ticking of life's great chronometer, while my mother leaned forward with pale, parted lips, and I gazed upon him as if the issues of life and death were in his hands.
"I wish I had been called sooner," said he, with a slight contraction of the brows, "but we will do all we can to relieve her."
He called for a basin and linen bandage, and taking a lancet from his pocket, held up the sharp, gleaming point to the light. I shuddered, I had never seen any one bled, and it seemed to me an awful operation.
"You will hold the basin," said he, directing me with his calm, benignant eye. "You are a brave girl,—you will not shrink, as some foolish persons do, at the sight of blood. This side, if you please, my dear."
Ashamed to forfeit the confidence he had in my bravery, or rather moral courage, I grasped the basin with both hands, and held it firm, though my lips quivered and my cheek blanched.
Peggy, awakened by the pressure of the bandage, began to rave and struggle, and I feared it would be impossible to subdue her into sufficient quietness; but delirious as she was, there was something in the calm, authoritative tones of Dr. Harlowe's voice, that seemed irresistible. She became still, and lay with her half-closed eyes fixed magnetically on his face. As the dark-red blood spouted into the basin, I started, and would have recoiled had not a strong controlling influence been exerted over me. The gates of life were opened. How easy for life itself to pass away in that deep crimson tide!
"This is the poetry of our profession," said the doctor, binding up the wound with all a woman's gentleness.
Poor Peggy, who could ever associate the idea of poetry with her! I could not help smiling as I looked at her sturdy arm, through whose opaque surface the blue wandering of the veins was vainly sought.
"And now," said he, after giving her a comforting draught, "she will sleep, andyoumust sleep, madam," turning respectfully to my mother; "you have not strength enough to resist fatigue,—your daughter will have two to nurse instead of one, if you do not follow my advice."
"I cannot sleep," replied my mother.
"But you can rest, madam; it is your duty. What did I come here for, but to relieve your cares? Go with your mother, my dear, and after a while you may come back and help me."
"You are very kind, sir," she answered. With a graceful bend of the head she passed from the room, while his eyes followed her with an expression of intense interest.
It is no wonder. Even I, accustomed as I was to watch her every motion, was struck by the exceeding grace of her manner. She did not ask the doctor what he thought of Peggy, though I saw the words trembling on her lips. She dared not do it.
From that night the seclusion of our cottage home was broken up. Disease had entered and swept down the barriers of circumstance curiosity had so long respected. We felt the drawings of that golden chain of sympathy which binds together the great family of mankind.
Peggy's disease was a fever, of a peculiar and malignant character. It was the first case which occurred; but it spread through the town, so that scarcely a family was exempt from its ravages. Several died after a few days' sickness, and it was said purplish spots appeared after death, making ghostly contrast with its livid pallor. The alarm and terror of the community rendered it difficult to obtain nurses for the sick; but, thanks to the benevolent exertions of Dr. Harlowe, we were never left alone.
Richard Clyde, too, came every day, and sometimes two or three times a day to the spring, to know what he could do for us. No brother could be kinder. Ah! how brightly, how vividly deeds of kindness stand out on the dark background of sickness and sorrow! I never, never can forget that era of my existence, when the destroying angel seemed winnowing the valley with his terrible wings,—when human life was blown away as chaff before a strong wind. Strange! the sky was as blue and benignant, the air as soft and serene, as if health and joy were revelling in the green-wood shade. The gentle rustling of the foliage, the sweet, glad warbling of the birds, the silver sparkling of the streamlets, and the calm, deep flowing of the distant river, all seemed in strange discordance with the throes of agony, the wail of sorrow, and the knell of death.
It was the first time I had ever been brought face to face with sickness and pain. The constitutional fainting fits of my mother were indicative of weakness, and caused momentary terror; but how different to this mysterious, terrible malady, this direct visitation from the Almighty! Here we could trace no second causes, no imprudence in diet, no exposure to the night air, no predisposing influences. It came sudden and powerful as the bolt of heaven. It came in sunshine and beauty, without herald and warning, whispering in deep, thrilling accents: "Be still, and know that I am God."
I do not wish to dwell too long on this sad page of my young life, but sad as it is, it is followed by another so dark, I know not whether my trembling hand should attempt to unfold it. Indeed, I fear I have commenced a task I had better have left alone. I know, however, I have scenes to relate full of the wildest romance, and that though what I have written may be childish and commonplace, I have that to relate which will interest, if the development of life's deepest passions have power to do so.
The history of a human heart! a true history of that mystery of mysteries! a description of that city of our God, more magnificent than the streets of the New Jerusalem! This is what I have commenced to write. I will go on.
For nine days Peggy wrestled with the destroying angel. During that time, nineteen funerals had darkened the winding avenue which led to the grave-yard, and she who was first attacked lingered last. It was astonishing how my mother sustained herself during these days and nights of intense anxiety. She seemed unconscious of fatigue, passive, enduring as the marble statue she resembled. She ate nothing,—she did not sleep. I know not what supported her. Dr. Harlowe brought her some of that generous wine which had infused such life into my young veins, and forced her to swallow it, but it never brought any color to her hueless cheeks.
On the morning of the ninth day, Peggy sunk into a deathlike stupor. Her mind had wandered during all her sickness, though most of the time she lay in a deep lethargy, from which nothing could rouse her.
"Go down to the spring and breathe the fresh air," said the doctor; "there should be perfect quiet here,—a few hours will decide her fate."
I went down to the spring, where the twilight shades were gathering. The air came with balmy freshness to my anxious, feverish brow. I scooped up the cold water in the hollow of my hand and bathed my face. I shook my hair over my shoulders, and dashed the water over every disordered tress. I began to breathe more freely. The burning weight, the oppression, the suffocation were passing away, but a dreary sense of misery, of coming desolation remained. I sat down on the long grass, and leaning my head on my clasped hands, watched the drops as they fell from my dropping hair on the mossy rock below.
"Is it not too damp for you here?"
I knew Richard Clyde was by me,—I heard his light footsteps on the sward, but I did not look up.
"It is not as damp as the grave will be," I answered.
"Don't talk so, Gabriella, don't. I cannot bear to hear you. This will be all over soon, and it will be to you like a dark and troubled dream."
"Yes; I know it will be all over soon. We shall all lie in the churchyard together,—Peggy, my mother, and I,—and you will plant a white rose over my mother's grave, will you not? Not over mine. No flowers have bloomed for me in life,—it would be nothing to place them over my sleeping dust."
"Gabriella! You are excited,—you are ill. Give me your hand. I know you have a feverish pulse."
I laid my hand on his, with an involuntary motion. Though it was moist with the drops that had been oozing over it, it had a burning heat. He startled at its touch.
"You are ill,—you are feverish!" he cried. "The close air of that little room has been killing you. I knew it would. You should have gone to Mrs. Linwood's, you and your mother, when she sent for you. Peggy would have been abundantly cared for."
"What, leave her here to die!—her, so good, so faithful, and affectionate, who would have died a thousand times over for us. Oh Richard, how can you speak of such a thing! Peggy is dying now,—I know that she is. I never looked on death, but I saw its shadow on her livid face. Why did Dr. Harlowe send me away? I am not afraid to see her die. Hark! my mother calls me."
I started up, but my head was dizzy, and I should have fallen had not Richard put his arm around me.
"Poor girl," said he, "I wish I had a sister to be with and comfort you. These are dark hours for us all, for we feel the pressure of God Almighty's hand. I do not wonder that you are crushed. You, so young and tender. But bear up, Gabriella. The day-spring will yet dawn, and the shadows fly away."
So he kept talking, soothingly, kindly, keeping me out in the balminess and freshness of the evening, while the fever atmosphere burned within. I knew not how long I sat. I knew not when I returned to the house. I have forgotten that. But I remember standing that night over a still, immovable form, on whose pale, peaceful brow, those purplish spots, of which I had heard in awful whispers, were distinctly visible. The tossing arms were crossed reposingly over the pulseless bosom,—the restless limbs were rigid as stone. I remember seeing my mother, whom they tried to lead into another chamber,—my mother, usually so calm and placid,—throw herself wildly on that humble, fever-blasted form, and cling to it in an agony of despair. It was only by the exertion of main force that she was separated from it and carried to her own apartment. There she fell into one of those deadly fainting fits, from which the faithful, affectionate Peggy had so often brought her back to life.
Never shall I forget that awful night. The cold presence of mortality in its most appalling form, the shadow of my mother's doom that was rolling heavily down upon me with prophetic darkness, the dismal preparations, the hurrying steps echoing so drearily through the midnight gloom; the cold burden of life, the mystery of death, the omnipotence of God, the unfathomableness of Eternity,—all pressed upon me with such a crushing weight, my spirit gasped and fainted beneath the burden.
One moment it seemed that worlds would not tempt me to look again on that shrouded form, so majestic in its dread immobility,—its cold, icy calmness,—then drawn by an awful fascination, I would gaze and gaze as if my straining eyes could penetrate the depths of that abyss, which no sounding line has ever reached.
I saw her laid in her lowly grave. My mother, too, was there. Dr. Harlowe did every thing but command her to remain at home, but she would not stay behind.
"I would follow her to her last home," said she, "if I had to walk barefoot over a path of thorns."
Only one sun rose on her unburied form,—its setting rays fell on a mound of freshly heaved sods, where a little while before was a mournful cavity.
Mrs. Linwood sent her beautiful carriage to take us to the churchyard. Slowly it rolled along behind the shadow of the dark, flapping pall. Very few beside ourselves were present, so great a panic pervaded the community; and very humble was the position Peggy occupied in the world. People wondered at the greatness of our grief, for she wasonlya servant. They did not know all that she was to us,—how could they? Even I dreamed not then of the magnitude of our obligations.
I never shall forget the countenance of my mother as she sat leaning from the carriage windows, for she was too feeble to stand during the burial, while I stood with Dr. Harlowe at the head of the grave. The sun was just sinking behind the blue undulation of the distant hills, and a mellow, golden lustre calmly settled on the level plain around us. It lighted up her pallid features with a kind of unearthly glow, similar to that which rested on the marble monuments gleaming through the weeping willows. Every thing looked as serene and lovely, as green and rejoicing, as if there were no such things as sickness and death in the world.
My mother's eyes wandered slowly over the whole inclosure, shut in by the plain white railing, edged with black,—gleamed on every gray stone, white slab, and green hillock,—rested a moment on me, then turned towards heaven, with such an expression!
"Not yet, my mother, oh, not yet!" I cried aloud in an agony that could not be repressed, clinging to Dr. Harlowe's arm as if every earthly stay and friend were sliding from my grasp. I knew the meaning of that mute, expressive glance. She was measuring her own grave by the side of Peggy's clay cold bed,—she was commending her desolate orphan to the Father of the fatherless, the God of the widow. She knew she would soon be there, and I knew it too. And after the first sharp pang,—after the arrow of conviction fastened in my heart,—I pressed it there with a kind of stern, vindictive joy, triumphing in my capacity of suffering. I wonder if any one ever felt as I did,—I wonder if any worm of the dust ever writhed so impotently under the foot of Almighty God!
O kind and compassionate Father! Now I know thou art kind even in thy chastisements, merciful even in thy judgments, by the bitter chalice I have drained, by all the waves and billows that have gone over me, by anguish, humiliation, repentance, and prayer. Forgive, forgive! for I knew not what I was doing!
From that night my mother never left her bed. The fever spared her, but she wilted like the grass beneath the scythe of the mower. Gone was the unnatural excitement which had sustained her the last nine days; severed the silver cord so long dimmed by secret tears.
Thank heaven! I was not doomed to see her tortured by pain, or raving in delirious agony,—to see those exquisite features distorted by frenzy,—or to hear that low, sweet voice untuned, the key-note of reason lost.
Thank heaven! even death laid its hand gently on one so gentle and so lovely.
I said, death laid its hand gently on one so gentle and so lovely. Week after week she lingered, almost imperceptibly fading, passing away like a soft rolling cloud that melts into the sky. The pestilence had stayed its ravages. The terror, the thick gloom had passed by.
If I looked abroad at sunset, I could see the windows of the village mansions, crimsoned and glowing with the last flames of day; but no light was reflected on our darkened home. It was all in shadow. And at night, when the windows of Grandison Place were all illuminated, glittering off by itself like a great lantern, the traveller could scarcely have caught the glimmering ray of the little lamp dimly burning in our curtained room.
Do you think I was resigned? That because I was dumb, I lay like a lamb before the stroke of the shearer? I will tell you how resigned, how submissive I was. I have read of the tortures of the Inquisition. I have read of one who was chained on his back to the dungeon floor, without the power to move one muscle,—hand and foot, body and limb bound. As he lay thus prone, looking up, ever upwards, he saw a circular knife, slowly descending, swinging like a pendulum, swinging nearer and nearer; and he knew that every breath he drew it came nearer and nearer, and that hemustfeel anon the cold, sharp edge. Yet he lay still, immovable, frozen, waiting, with his glazed eyes fixed on the terrible weapon. Such wasmyresignation—mysubmission.
Friends gathered around the desolate; but they could not avert the descending stroke. Mrs. Linwood came, with her angelic looking daughter, and their presence lighted up, momentarily, our saddened dwelling, as if they had been messengers from heaven,—they were so kind, so sympathizing, so unobtrusive. When Edith first crossed our threshold, she did indeed look like one of those ministering spirits, sent to watch over those who shall be heirs of salvation. She seemed to float forward, light and airy as the down wafted by the summer gale. Her crutches, the ends of which were wrapped with something soft and velvety, so as to muffle their sound, rather added than detracted from the interest and grace of her appearance, so gracefully they sustained her fair, white-robed form, just lifting it above the earth.
A little while before, I should have shrunk with nervous diffidence from the approach of guests like these. I should have contrasted painfully the splendor of their position with the lowliness of our own,—but now, what were wealth or rank or earthly distinctions to me?
I was sitting by my mother's bed, fanning her slumbers, as they entered. Mrs. Linwood walked noiselessly forward, took the fan gently from my hand, and motioned me to resign my seat to her. I did so mechanically, for it seemed she had a right to be there. Then Edith took me by the hand and looked in my face with an expression of such sweet, unaffected sympathy, I turned aside to hide the quick-gushing tears. Not a word was uttered, yet I knew they came to soothe and comfort.
When my mother opened her eyes and saw the face of a stranger bending over her, she started and trembled; but there was something in the mild, Christian countenance of Mrs. Linwood that disarmed her fears, and inspired confidence. The pride which had hitherto repelled the advances of friendship, was all chastened and subdued. Death, the great leveller, had entered the house, and the mountains of human distinction flowed down at his presence.
"I am come to nurse you," said Mrs. Linwood, taking my mother's pale, emaciated hand and pressing it in both her own. "Do not look upon me as a stranger, but as a friend—a sister. You will let me stay, will you not?"
She seemed soliciting a favor, not conferring one.
"Thank you,—bless you!" answered my mother, her large dark eyes fixed with thrilling intensity on her face. Then she added, in a lower voice, glancing towards me, "shewill not be left friendless, then. You will rememberherwhen I am gone."
"Kindly, tenderly, even with a mother's care," replied Mrs. Linwood, tears suffusing her mild eyes, and testifying the sincerity of her words.
My mother laid Mrs. Linwood's hand on her heart, whose languid beating scarcely stirred the linen that covered it; then looking up to heaven, her lips moved in silent prayer. A smile, faint but beautiful, passed over her features, and left its sweetness on her face. From that hour to the death-hour Mrs. Linwood did minister to her, as a loving sister would have done. Edith often accompanied her mother and tried to comfort me, but I was then inaccessible to comfort, as I was deaf to hope. When she stayed away, I missed the soft floating of her airy figure, the pitying glance of her heavenly blue eye; but when she came, I said to myself,
"Hermother is not dying. How can she sympathize with me? She is the favorite of Him who is crushing me beneath the iron hand of His wrath."
Thus impious were my thoughts, but no one read them on my pale, drooping brow. Mrs. Linwood praised my filial devotion, my fortitude and heroism. Dr. Harlowe had told her how I had braved the terrors of midnight solitude through the lonely woods, to bring him to a servant's bedside. Richard Clyde had interested her in my behalf. She told me I had many friends for one so young and so retiring. Oh! she little knew how coldly fell the words of praise on the dull ear of despair. I smiled at the thought of needing kindness and protection whenshewas gone. As if it were possible for me to survive my mother!
Had she not herself told me that grief did not kill? But I believed her not.
Do you ask if I felt no curiosity then, about the mystery of my parentage? I had been looking forward to the time when I should be deemed old enough to know my mother's history of which my imagination had woven such a web of mystery and romance,—when I should hear something of that father whose memory was curtained by such an impenetrable veil. But now it mattered not. Had I known that the blood of kings was in my veins, it would not have wakened one throb of ambition, kindled one ray of joy. I cared not for my lineage or kindred. I would not have disturbed the serenity that seemed settling on my mother's departing spirit, by one question relative to her past life, for the wealth of the Indies.
She gave to Mrs. Linwood a manuscript which she had written while I was at school, and which was to have been committed to Peggy's care;—for surely Peggy, the strong, the robust, unwearied Peggy, would survive her, the frail, delicate, and stricken one!
She told me this the night before she died, when at her own request I was left alone with her. I knew it was for the last time, but I had been looking forward steadily to this hour,—looking as I said before, as the iron-bound prisoner to the revolving knife, and like him I was outwardly calm. I knelt beside her and looked on her shadowy form, her white, transparent skin, her dark, still lustrous, though sunken eyes, till it seemed that her spirit, almost disembodied, mingled mysteriously with mine, in earnest of a divine communion.
"I thank God, my Gabriella," she said, laying her hand blessingly on my bowed head, "that you submit to His holy will, in a spirit of childlike submission. I thank Him for raising up such a friend as Mrs. Linwood, when friend and comforter seemed taken from us. Love her, confide in her, be grateful to her, my child. Be grateful to God for sending her to soothe my dying hours with promises of protection and love for you, my darling, my child, my poor orphan Gabriella."
"Oh mother," I cried, "I do not submit,—I cannot,—I cannot! Dreadful thoughts are in my heart—oh, my mother, God is very terrible. Leave me not alone to meet his awful judgments. Put your arms round me, my mother, and let me lie close to your bosom, I will not hurt you, I will lie so gently there. Death cannot separate us, when we cling so close together. Leave me not alone in the world, so cold, so dark, so dreary,—oh, leave me not alone!" Thus I clung to her, in the abandonment of despair, while words rushed unhidden from my lips.
"Oh, my Gabriella, my child, my poor smitten lamb!" she cried, and I felt her heart fluttering against mine like a dying bird. "Sorrow has bereft you of reason,—you know not what you say. Gabriella, it is an awful thing to resist the Almighty God. Submission is the heritage of dust and ashes.Ihave been proud and rebellious, smarting under a sense of unmerited chastisement and wrong. Because man was false, I thought God unjust,—but now, on this dying bed, the illusion of passion is dispelled, and I see Him as He is, longsuffering, compassionate, and indulgent, in all his loving-kindness and tender mercy, strong to deliver and mighty to save. I feel that I have needed all the discipline of sorrow through which I have passed, to bring my proud and troubled soul, a sin-sick, life weary wanderer, to my Father's footstool. What matters now, my Gabriella, that I have trod a thorny path, if it lead to heaven at last? How short the journey,—how long the rest! Oh, beloved child, bow to the hand that smites thee, for the stubborn willmustbe broken. Wait not, like me, till it be ground into dust."
She paused breathless and exhausted, but I answered not. Low sobs came gaspingly from my bosom, on which a mountain of ice seemed freezing.
"If we could die together," she continued, with increasing solemnity, "if I could bear you in these feeble arms to the mercy-seat of God, and know you were safe from temptation, and sorrow, and sin, the bitterness of death would be passed. It is a fearful thing to live, my child, far more fearful than to die,—but life is the trial of faith, and death the victory."
"And now," she added, "before my spirit wings its upward flight, receive my dying injunction. If you live to years of womanhood, and your heart awakens to love,—as, alas, for woman's destiny it will,—then read my life and sad experience, and be warned by my example. Mrs. Linwood is intrusted with the manuscript, blotted with your mother's tears. Oh, Gabriella, by all your love and reverence for the memory of the dead,—by the scarlet dye that can be made white as wool,—by your own hope in a Saviour's mercy, forgive the living,—if livingheindeed be!"
Her eyes closed as she uttered these words, and a purplish gloom gathered beneath her eyes. The doctor came in and administered ether, which partially revived her. I have never been able to inhale it since, without feeling sick and faint, and recalling the deadly odor of that chamber of mourning.
About daybreak, I heard Dr. Harlowe say in the lowest whisper to Mrs. Linwood thatshecould not live more than one hour. He turned the hour-glass as he spoke. She had collected all the energies of life in that parting interview,—nothing remained but a faint, fluttering, quick-drawn breath.
I sat looking at the hour-glass, counting every gliding sand, till each little, almost invisible particle, instead of dropping into the crystal receptacle, seemed to fall on my naked heart like the mountain rock. O my God! there are only two or three sands left, and my mother's life hangs on the last sinking grain. Some one rises with noiseless steps to turn the glass.
With a shriek that might have arrested the departing spirit, I sprang forward and fell senseless on the floor.
I remember nothing that passed during the day. I was told afterwards, that when I recovered from the fainting fit, the doctor, apprehensive of spasms, gave me a powerful anodyne to quiet my tortured nerves. When I became conscious of what was passing around me, the moon was shining on the bed where I lay, and the shadow of the softly rustling leaves quivering on the counterpane. I was alone, but I heard low, murmuring voices in the next room, and there was a light there more dim and earthly than the pale splendor that enveloped me. I leaned forward on my elbow and looked beyond the open door. The plain white curtains of the bed were looped up on each side, and the festoons swayed heavily in the night air, which made the flame of the lamp dim and wavering. A form reclined on the bed, but the face wasall covered, though it was a midsummer's night. As I looked, I remembered all, and I rose and glided through the moonlight to the spot where my mother slept. Sustained by unnatural excitement, I seemed borne on air, and as much separated from the body as the spirit so lately divorced from that unbreathing clay; it was the effect of the opiate I had taken, but the pale watchers in the death-chamber shuddered at my unearthly appearance.
"Let there be no light here but light from heaven," said I, extinguishing the fitful lamp-flame; and the room was immediately illuminated with a white, ghostly lustre. Then kneeling by the bed, I folded back the linen sheet, gazed with folded hands, and dry, dilated eyes on the mystery of death. The moon, "that sun of the sleepless," that star of the mourner, shone full on her brow, and I smiled to see how divinely fair, how placid, how angelic she looked. Her dark, shining hair, the long dark lashes that pencilled her white cheek, alone prevented her from seeming a statue of the purest marble, fashioned after some Grecian model. Beauty and youth had come back to her reposing features, and peace and rapture too. A smile, such as no living lips ever wore, lingered round her mouth and softened its mute expression. She was happy. God had given his beloved rest. She was happy. It was not death on which I was gazing; it was life,—the dawn of immortal, of eternal life. Angels were watching around her. I did not see them, but I felt the shadow of their snow-white wings. I felt them fanning my brow and softly lifting the locks that fell darkly against the sheet, so chilly white. Others might have thought it the wind sighing through the leafy lattice-work; but the presence of angels was real to me,—and who can say they were not hovering there?
That scene is past, but its remembrance is undying. The little cottage is inhabited by strangers. The grass grows rank near the brink of the fountain, and the mossy stone once moistened by my tears has rolled down and choked its gushing. My mother sleeps by the side of the faithful Peggy, beneath a willow that weeps over a broken shaft,—fitting monument for a broken heart.
I will not dwell on the desolation of orphanage. It cannot be described. My Maker only knows the bitterness of my grief for days, weeks, even months. But time gradually warms the cold clay over the grave of love; then the grass springs up, and the flowers bloom, and the waste places of life become beautiful with hope, and the wilderness blossoms like the rose.
But oh, my mother! my gentle, longsuffering mother! thou hast never been forgotten. By day and by night, in sunshine and shadow, in joy and in sorrow, thou art with me, a holy spirit, a hallowed memory, a chastening influence, that passeth not away.
What a change, from the little gray cottage in the woods to the pillared walls of Grandison Place.
This ancestral looking mansion was situated on the brow of a long, winding hill, which commanded a view of the loveliest valley in the world. A bold, sweeping outline of distant hills, here and there swelling into mountains, and crowned with a deeper, mistier blue, divided the rich green of the earth from the azure of the heavens. Far as the eye could reach, it beheld the wildest luxuriance of nature refined and subdued by the hand of cultivation and taste. Man had reverenced the grandeur of the Creator, and made the ploughshare turn aside from the noble shade-tree, and left the streams rejoicing in their margins of verdure; and far off, far away beneath the shadow of the misty blue hills,—of a paler, more leaden hue,—the waters of the great sea seemed ready to roll down on the vale, that lay smiling before it.
Built of native granite, with high massive walls and low turreted roof, Grandison Place rose above the surrounding buildings in castellated majesty. It stood in the centre of a spacious lawn, zoned by a girdle of oaks, beneath whose dense shade the dew sparkled even at noonday. Within this zone was a hedge of cedar, so smooth, with twigs so thickly interwoven, that the gossamer thought it a framework, on which to stretch its transparent web in the morning sun. Near the house the lawn was margined with beds of the rarest and most beautiful flowers, queen roses, and all the fragrant populace of the floral world. But the grandest and most beautiful feature of all was a magnificent elm-tree, standing right in the centre of the green inclosure, toweling upward, sweeping downward, spreading on either side its lordly branches, "from storms a shelter and from heat a shade."
I never saw so noble a tree. I loved it,—I reverenced it. I associated with it the idea of strength and protection. Had I seen the woodman's axe touch its bark, I should have felt as if blood would stream from its venerable trunk. A circular bench with a back formed of boughs woven in checker-work surrounded it, and at twilight the soft sofas in the drawing-room were left vacant for this rustic seat.
Edith loved it, and when she sat there with her crutches leaning against the rough back, whose gray tint subdued the bright lustre of her golden hair, I would throw myself on the grass at her feet and gaze upon her, as the embodiment of human loveliness.
One would suppose that I felt awkward and strange in the midst of such unaccustomed magnificence; but it was not so. It seemed natural and right for me to be there. I trod the soft, rich, velvety carpeting with a step as unembarrassed as when I traversed the grassy lawn. I was as much at home among the splendors of art as the beauties of nature,—both seemed my birthright.
I felt the deepest, most unbounded gratitude for my benefactress; but there was nothing abject in it. I knew that giving did not impoverish her; that the food I ate was not as much to her as the crumbs that fell from my mother's table; that the room I occupied was but one in a suite of elegant apartments; yet this did not diminish my sense of obligation. It lightened it, however, of its oppressive weight.
My room was next to Edith's. The only difference in the furniture was in the color of the hangings. The curtains and bed drapery of mine were pink, hers blue. Both opened into an upper piazza, whose lofty pillars were wreathed with flowering vines, and crowned with Corinthian capitals. Surely my love for the beautiful ought to have been satisfied; and so it was,—but it was long, long before my heart opened to receive its influence. The clods that covered my mother's ashes laid too heavily upon it.
Mrs. Linwood had a great deal of company from the city, which was but a short journey from Grandison Place. As they were mostly transient guests, I saw but little of them. My extreme youth, and deep mourning dress, were sufficient reasons for withdrawing from the family circle when strangers enlarged it. Edith was three years older than myself, and was of course expected to assist her mother in the honors of hospitality. She loved society, moreover, and entered into its innocent pleasures with the delight of a young, genial nature. It was difficult to think of her as a young lady, she was so extremely juvenile in her appearance; and her lameness, by giving her an air of childish dependence, added to the illusion caused by her fair, clustering ringlets and infantine rosiness of complexion. She wanted to bring me forward;—she coaxed, caressed, and playfully threatened, nor desisted till her mother said, with grave tenderness—
"The heart cannot be forced, Edith; Gabriella is but a child, and should be allowed the freedom of a child. The restraints of social life, once assumed, are not easily thrown aside. Let her do just as she pleases."
And so I did; and it pleased me to wander about the lawn; to sit and read under the great elm-tree; to make garlands of myrtle and sweet running vine flowers for Edith's beautiful hair; to walk the piazza, when moonlight silvered the columns and covered with white glory the granite walls, while the fountain of poetry down in the depths of my soul welled and trembled in the heavenly lustre.
It pleased me to sit in the library, or rather to stand and move about there, for at that time I did not like to sit anywhere but on the grass or the oaken bench. The old poets were there in rich binding, all the classics, and the choicest specimens of modern literature. There were light, airy, movable steps, so as to reach to the topmost shelves, and there I loved to poise myself, like a bird on the spray, peeping into this book and that, gathering here and there a golden grain or sweet scented flower for the garner of thought, or the bower of imagination.
There were statues in niches made to receive them,—the gods and goddesses of Greece and Rome, in their cold, severe beauty, all passionless and pure, in spite of the glowing mythology that called them into existence. There were paintings, too, that became a part of my being, I took them in with such intense, gazing eyes. Indeed, the house was lined with them. I could not walk through a room without stopping to admire some work of genius, some masterpiece of art.
I over-heard Dr. Harlowe say to Mrs. Linwood, that it was a pity I were not at school, I was so very young. As if I were not at school all the time! As if those grand old books were not teachers; those breathing statues, those gorgeous paintings were not teachers; as if the noble edifice itself, with its magnificent surroundings, the billowy heave of the distant mountains, the glimpses of the sublime sea, the fair expanse of the beautiful valley, were not teachers!
Oh! they little knew what lessons I was learning. They little knew how the soul of the silent orphan girl was growing within her,—how her imagination, like flowers, was nourished in stillness and secrecy by the air and the sunshine, the dew and the shower.
I had other teachers, too, in the lonely churchyard; very solemn they were, and gentle too, and I loved their voiceless instructions better than the sounding eloquence of words.
Mr. Regulus thought with Dr. Harlowe, that it was a pity I was not at school. He called to see Mrs. Linwood and asked her to use her influence to induce me to return as a pupil to the academy. She left it to my decision, but I shrunk from the thought of contact with the rude village children. I felt as if I had learned all Mr. Regulus could teach me. I was under greater masters now. Yet I was grateful for the interest he manifested in me. I had no vindictive remembrance of the poem he had so ruthlessly murdered. Innumerable acts of after kindness had obliterated the impression, or rather covered it with a growth of pleasant memories.
"Have you given up entirely the idea of being a teacher yourself?" he asked, in a low voice, "or has the kindness of friends rendered it superfluous? I do not ask from curiosity out a deep interest in your future welfare."
This was a startling question. I had not thought of the subject since I had entered my new home. Why should I think of the drudgery of life, pillowed on the downy couch of luxury and ease? I was forgetting that I was but the recipient of another's bounty,—a guest, but not a child of the household.
Low as was his voice, I knew Mrs. Linwood heard and understood him, for her eyes rested on me with a peculiar expression of anxiety and interest. She did not speak, and I knew not what to utter. A burning glow rose to my cheeks, and my heart fluttered with painful apprehension. It was all a dream, then. That home of affluence was not mine,—it was only the asylum of my first days of orphanage. The maternal tenderness of Mrs. Linwood was nothing more than compassion and Christian charity, and the sisterly affection of the lovely Edith but the overflowing of the milk of human kindness. These were my first, flashing thoughts; then the inherent pride of my nature rose to sustain me. I would never be a willing burden to any one. I would toil day and night, sooner than eat the bread of dependence. It would have been far better to have left me in the humble cottage where they found me, to commence my life of drudgery at once, than to have given me a taste of luxury and affluence, to heighten, by force of contrast, privation and labor.
"I will commence teaching immediately," I answered, trying in vain to speak with firmness, "if you think I am not too young, and a situation can be obtained;" "that is," I added, I fear a little proudly, "if Mrs. Linwood approve."
"It must not be thought ofat present," she answered, speaking to Mr. Regulus. "Gabriella is too young yet to assume the burden of authority. Her physical powers are still undeveloped. Besides, we shall pass the winter in the metropolis. Next summer we will talk about it."
"They speak of adding a primary department to the academy," said my former master, "which will be under female superintendence. If thisisdone, and she would accept the situation, I think I have influence enough to secure it for her."
"We will see to that hereafter," said Mrs. Linwood; "but of one thing I am assured, if Gabriella ever wishes to assume duties so honorable and so feminine, she would think it a privilege to be under your especial guardianship, and within reach of your experience and counsel."
I tried to speak, and utter an assent to this wise and decided remark, but I could not. I felt the tears gushing into my eyes, and hastily rising, I left the room. I did not go out on the lawn, for I saw Edith's white robes under the trees, and I knew the guests of the city were with her. I ran up stairs to my own apartment, or that which was called mine, and, sitting down in an embrasure of the window, drew aside the rosy damask and gazed around me.
Do not judge me too harshly. I was ungrateful; I knew I was. My heart rose against Mrs. Linwood for her cold decision. I forgot, for the moment, her holy ministrations to my dying mother, her care and protection of me, when left desolate and alone. I forgot that I had no claims on her beyond what her compassion granted. I realized all at once that I was poor and dependent, though basking in the sunshine of wealth.
In justice to myself I must say, that the bitterest tears I then shed were caused by disappointment in Mrs. Linwood's exalted character. I had imagined her "bounty as boundless as the sea, her love as deep." Now the noble proportion of her virtues seemed dwarfed, their luxuriance stinted, and withering too.
While I was thus cheating my benefactress of her fair perfections, she came in with her usual quiet and stilly step, and sat down beside me. The consciousness of what was passing in my mind, made the guilty blood rush warm to my face.
"You have been weeping, Gabriella," she said, in gentle accents; "your feelings are wounded, you think me cold, perhaps unkind."
"Oh, madam, what have I said?"
"Nothing, my dear child, and yet I have read every thing. Your ingenuous countenance expressed on my entrance as plain as words could utter, 'Hate me, for I am an ingrate.'"
"You do, indeed, read very closely."
"Could you look as closely into my heart, Gabriella, were my face as transparent as yours, you would understand at once my apparent coldness as anxiety for your highest good. Did I consult my own pleasure, without regard to that discipline by which the elements of character are wrought into beauty and fitness, I should cherish no wish but to see you ever near me as now, indulging the sweet dreams of youth, only the more fascinating for being shadowed with melancholy. I would save you, if possible, from becoming the victim of a diseased imagination, or too morbid a sensibility."
I looked up, impressed with her calm, earnest tones, and as I listened, conscience upbraided me with injustice and ingratitude.
"There is a period in every young girl's life, my dear Gabriella, when she is in danger of becoming a vain and idle dreamer, when the amusements of childhood have ceased to interest, and the shadow of woman's destiny involves the pleasures of youth. The mind is occupied with vague imaginings, the heart with restless cravings for unknown blessings. With your vivid imagination and deep sensibility, your love of reverie and abstraction, there is great danger of your yielding unconsciously to habits the more fatal in their influence, because apparently as innocent as they are insidious and pernicious. A life of active industry and usefulness is the only safeguard from temptation and sin."
Oh, how every true word she uttered ennobled her in my estimation, while it humbled myself. Idler that I was in my Father's vineyard, I was holding out my hands for the clustering grapes, whose purple juice is for him who treadeth the wine-press.
"Were my own Edith physically strong," she added, "I would ask no nobler vocation for her than the one suggested to you this day. I should rejoice to see her passing through a discipline so chastening and exalting. I should rejoice to see her exercising the faculties which God has given her for the benefit of her kind. The possession of wealth does not exempt one from the active duties of life, from self-sacrifice, industry and patient continuance in well-doing. The little I have done for you, all that I can do, is but a drop from the fountain, and were it ten times more would never be missed. It is not that I would give less, but I would require more. While I live, this shall ever be your home, where you shall feel a mother's care, protection, and tenderness; but I want you to form habits of self-reliance, independence, and usefulness, which will remain your friends, though other friends should be taken from you."
Dear, excellent Mrs. Linwood! how my proud, rebellious heart melted before her! What resolutions I formed to be always governed by her influence, and guided by her counsels! How vividly her image rises before me, as she then looked, in her customary dress of pale, silver gray, her plain yet graceful lace cap, simply parted hair, and calm, benevolent countenance.
She was the most unpretending of human beings. She moved about the house with a step as stilly as the falling dews. Indeed, such was her walk through life. She seemed born to teach mankind unostentatious charity. Yet, under this mild, calm exterior, she had a strong, controlling will, which all around her felt and acknowledged. From the moment she drew the fan from my hand, at my mother's bedside, to the hour I left her dwelling, she acted upon me with a force powerful as the sun, and as benignant too.
If I do not pass more rapidly over these early scenes, I shall never finish my book.
Book!—am I writing a book? No, indeed! This is only a record of my heart's life, written at random and carelessly thrown aside, sheet after sheet, sibylline leaves from the great book of fate. The wind may blow them away, a spark consume them. I may myself commit them to the flames. I am tempted to do so at this moment.
I once thought it a glorious thing to be an author,—to touch the electric wire of sentiment, and know that thousands would thrill at the shock,—to speak, and believe that unborn millions would hear the music of those echoing words,—to possess the wand of the enchanter, the ring of the genii, the magic key to the temple of temples, the pass-word to the universe of mind. I once had such visions as these, but they are passed.
To touch the electric wire, and feel the bolt scathing one's own brain,—to speak, to hear the dreary echo of one's voice return through the desert waste,—to enter the temple and find nothing but ruins and desolation,—to lay a sacrifice on the altar, and see no fire from heaven descend in token of acceptance,—to stand the priestess of a lonely shrine, uttering oracles to the unheeding wind,—is not such too often the doom of those who have looked to fame as their heritage, believing genius their dower?
Heaven save me from such a destiny. Better the daily task, the measured duty, the chained-down spirit, the girdled heart.
A year after Mrs. Linwood pointed out to me the path of duty, I began to walk in it. I have passed the winter in the city, but it was one of deep seclusion to me. I welcomed with rapture our return to the country, and had so far awakened from dream-life, as to prepare myself with steadiness of purpose for the realities of my destiny.
Edith rebelled against her mother's decision. There was no need of such a thing. I was too young, too delicate, too sensitive for so rough a task. There was a plenty of robust country girls to assist Mr. Regulus, if he wanted them to, without depriving her of her companion and sister. She appealed to Dr. Harlowe, in her sweet, bewitching way, which always seemed irresistible; but he only gave her a genial smile, called me "a brave little girl," and bade me "God speed." "I wish Richard Clyde were here," said she, in her own artless, half-childish manner, "I am sure he would be on my side. I wish brother Ernest would come home, he would decide the question. Oh, Gabriella, if you only knew brother Ernest!"
If I have not mentioned thisbrother Ernestbefore, it is not because I had not heard his name repeated a thousand times. He was the only son and brother of the family, who, having graduated with the first honors at the college of his native State, was completing his education in Germany, at the celebrated University of Gottingen. There was a picture of him in the library, taken just before he left the country, on which I had gazed, till it was to me a living being. It was a dark, fascinating face,—a face half of sunshine and half shadow, a face of mysterious meanings; as different from Edith's as night from morning. It reminded me of the head of Byron, but it expressed deeper sensibility, and the features were even more symmetrically handsome.
Edith, who was as frank and artless as a child, was always talking of her brother, of his brilliant talents, his genius, and peculiarities. She showed me his letters, which were written with extraordinary beauty and power, though the sentiments were somewhat obscured by a transcendental mistiness belonging to the atmosphere he breathed.
"Ernest never was like anybody else," said Edith; "he is the most singular, but the most fascinating of human beings. Oh Gabriella, I long to have him come back, that you may know and admire him."
Though I knew by ten thousand signs that this absent son was the first object of Mrs. Linwood's thoughts, she seldom talked of him to me. She often, when Edith was indulging in her enthusiastic descriptions of him, endeavored to change the conversation and turn my thoughts in other channels.
But why do I speak of Ernest Linwood here? It is premature. I was about to describe a little part of my experience as a village teacher.
Edith had a beautiful little pony, gentle as a lamb, yet very spirited withal, (for lame though she was, she was a graceful and fearless equestrian,) which it was arranged that I should ride every morning, escorted by a servant, who carried the pony back for Edith's use. Dr. Harlowe, who resided near the academy, said I was always to dine at his house, and walk home in the evening. They must not make too much of a fine lady of me. I must exercise, if I would gather the roses of health. Surely no young girl could begin the ordeal of duty under kinder, more favoring auspices.
After the first dreaded morning when Mr. Regulus, tall, stately, and imposing, ushered me into the apartment where I was to preside with delegated authority, led me up a low flight of steps and waved his hand towards a high magisterial arm-chair which was to be my future throne, I felt a degree of self-confidence that surprised and encouraged me. Every thing was so novel, so fresh, it imparted an elasticity to my spirits I had not felt in Mrs. Linwood's luxurious home. Then there was something self-sustaining, inspiring in the consciousness of intellectual exertion and moral courage, in the thought that I was doing some little good in the world, that I was securing the approbation of Mrs. Linwood and of the excellent Dr. Harlowe. The children, who had most of them been my fellow pupils, looked upon Gabriella Lynn, the protégée of the rich Mrs. Linwood, as a different being from Gabriella Lynn of the little gray cottage in the woods. I have no doubt they thought it very grand to ride on that beautiful pony, with its saddle-cloth of blue and silver, and glittering martingale, escorted by a servant too! Had they been disposed to rebel at my authority, they would not have dared to do so, for Mr. Regulus, jealous for my new dignity, watched over it with an eagle eye.
Where were the chains, whose prophetic clanking had chilled my misgiving heart? They were transformed to flowery garlands, of daily renewing fragrance and bloom. My desk was literally covered with blossoms while their season lasted, and little fairy fingers were always twining with wreaths the dark hair they loved to arrange according to their own juvenile fancies.
My noon hours at Dr. Harlowe's, were pleasant episodes in my daily life. Mrs. Harlowe was an excellent woman. She was called by the villagers "a most superior woman,"—and so she was, if admirable housekeeping and devotion to her husband's interests entitled her to the praise. She was always busy; but the doctor, though he had a wide sweep of practice in the surrounding country, always seemed at leisure. There was something so cheerful, so encouraging about him, despondency fled from his presence and gave place to hope.
I love to recall this era of my life. If I have known deeper happiness, more exalted raptures, they were dearly purchased by the sacrifice of the peace, the salubrity of mind I then enjoyed. I had a little room of my own there, where I was as much at home as I was at Mrs. Linwood's. There was a place for my bonnet and parasol, a shelf for my books, a low rocking-chair placed at the pleasantest window for me; and, knowing Mrs. Harlowe's methodical habits, I was always careful to leave every thing, as I found it, in Quaker-like order. This was the smallest return I could make for her hospitality, and she appreciated it far beyond its merits. The good doctor, with all his virtues, tried the patience of his wife sometimes beyond its limits, by his excessive carelessness. Hewouldforget to hang his hat in the hall, and toss it on the bright, polished mahogany table. Hewouldforget to use the scraper by the steps, or the mat by the door, and leave tracks on the clean floor or nice carpet. These little things really worried her; I could see they did. She never said any thing; but she would get up, take up the hat, brush the table with her handkerchief, and hang the hat in its right place, or send the house-girl with the broom after his disfiguring tracks.
"Pardon me, my dear," he would say with imperturbable good-nature,—"really, I am too forgetful. I must have a self-regulating machine attached to my movements,—a portable duster and hat-catcher. But, the blessed freedom of home. It constitutes half its joy. Dear me! I would not exchange the privilege of doing as I please for the emperorship of the celestial realms."
But, pleasant as were my noon rests, my homeward walks were pleasanter still. The dream-girl, after being awake for long hours to the practical duties of life, loved to ramble alone, till she felt herself involved in the soft haziness of thought, which was to the soul what the blue mistiness was to the distant hills. I could wander then alone to the churchyard, and yield myself unmolested to the sacred influences of memory. Do you remember my asking Richard Clyde to plant a white rose by my mother's grave? He had done so, soon after her burial, and now, when rather more than a year had passed, it was putting forth fair buds and blossoms, and breathing of renovation over the ruins of life. I never saw this rose-tree without blessing the hand which planted it; and I loved to sit on the waving grass and listen to the soft summer wind stealing through it, rustling among the dry blades and whispering with the green ones.
There was one sentence that fell from my mother's dying lips which ever came to me in the sighs of the gale, fraught with mournful mystery. "Because man wasfalse, I dared to think God was unjust." And had she not adjured me by every precious and every solemn consideration, "to forgive theliving, if livingheindeed was?"
I knew these words referred to my father; and what a history of wrong and sorrow was left for my imagination to fill up! Living!—my father living! Oh! there is no grave so deep as that dug by the hand of neglect or desertion! He had been dead to my mother,—he had been dead to me. I shuddered at the thought of breathing the same vital element. He who had broken a mother's heart must be a fiend, worthy of eternal abhorrence.
"If you live to years of womanhood," said my expiring mother, "and your heart awakens to love, as alas for woman's destiny it will, then read my life's sad experience, and be warned by my example."
Sad prophetess! Death has consecrated thy prediction, but it is yet unfulfilled. When will womanhood commence, on whose horizon the morning star of love is to rise in clouded lustre?
Surely I am invested with a woman's dignity, in that great arm-chair, behind the green-covered desk. I feel very much like a blown rose, surrounded by the rose-bud garland of childhood. Yet Dr. Harlowe calls me "little girl," and Mr. Regulus "my child," when the pupils are not by; then it is "Miss Gabriella." They forget that I am sixteen, and that I have grown taller and more womanly in the last year; but the awakening heart has not yet throbbed at its dawning destiny, the day-star of love has not risen on its slumbers.