TO THE LILY OF THE VALLEY.

———

BY PROFESSOR CAMPBELL.

———

Sweet little flower,That hang’st thy fair and modest headBeneath the shower,And bendest o’er thy parent bed,As mourning for thy sisters dead—Oh! smile again—the storm has fled.Ah! who could breakThy tender stem, so very fair,So very weak—To deck his breast, to perish there,Beneath the coldly piercing air,Of harsh neglect, regret, despair?Nay, droop not so—No ruthless hand shall touch thee here⁠—No, gentlest, no—I’ll hide thee where, devoid of fear,Thou’lt bloom, to one lone heart most dear,Nor ruder love than mine be near.And I will leaveAll other cares, and steal to see,At morn and eve,Mine own lov’d flowret’s purity—For I alone shall smile on thee,And thou alone shall smile on me.And when thou’rt goneAnd all thy sweetness buried deep,And I alone—Still will I in my fond heart keepThy memory green, and come to weep,Where thou, my loved one, shalt sleep.And soon, dear flow’r,Ah, very soon I’ll follow thee—My little hourOf fated life must quickly flee—Then cold and lone my grave shall be,Without a tear—oh! not like thee.

Sweet little flower,That hang’st thy fair and modest headBeneath the shower,And bendest o’er thy parent bed,As mourning for thy sisters dead—Oh! smile again—the storm has fled.

Sweet little flower,

That hang’st thy fair and modest head

Beneath the shower,

And bendest o’er thy parent bed,

As mourning for thy sisters dead—

Oh! smile again—the storm has fled.

Ah! who could breakThy tender stem, so very fair,So very weak—To deck his breast, to perish there,Beneath the coldly piercing air,Of harsh neglect, regret, despair?

Ah! who could break

Thy tender stem, so very fair,

So very weak—

To deck his breast, to perish there,

Beneath the coldly piercing air,

Of harsh neglect, regret, despair?

Nay, droop not so—No ruthless hand shall touch thee here⁠—No, gentlest, no—I’ll hide thee where, devoid of fear,Thou’lt bloom, to one lone heart most dear,Nor ruder love than mine be near.

Nay, droop not so—

No ruthless hand shall touch thee here⁠—

No, gentlest, no—

I’ll hide thee where, devoid of fear,

Thou’lt bloom, to one lone heart most dear,

Nor ruder love than mine be near.

And I will leaveAll other cares, and steal to see,At morn and eve,Mine own lov’d flowret’s purity—For I alone shall smile on thee,And thou alone shall smile on me.

And I will leave

All other cares, and steal to see,

At morn and eve,

Mine own lov’d flowret’s purity—

For I alone shall smile on thee,

And thou alone shall smile on me.

And when thou’rt goneAnd all thy sweetness buried deep,And I alone—Still will I in my fond heart keepThy memory green, and come to weep,Where thou, my loved one, shalt sleep.

And when thou’rt gone

And all thy sweetness buried deep,

And I alone—

Still will I in my fond heart keep

Thy memory green, and come to weep,

Where thou, my loved one, shalt sleep.

And soon, dear flow’r,Ah, very soon I’ll follow thee—My little hourOf fated life must quickly flee—Then cold and lone my grave shall be,Without a tear—oh! not like thee.

And soon, dear flow’r,

Ah, very soon I’ll follow thee—

My little hour

Of fated life must quickly flee—

Then cold and lone my grave shall be,

Without a tear—oh! not like thee.

“GOOD-NIGHT.”

———

FOUND AMONG THE PAPERS OF THE LATE WALTER HERRIES, ESQ.

———

“Good-night!” the words were spoken, and we parted,Ito my lonely home, to muse on thee,With spirit bowed and saddened, broken-hearted⁠—Andthou, to dreams of joy—but not of me.“Good-night!” how very coldly it was spoken;But those loved tones are lingering near me yet,And though of tenderness they bring no token,I would not, if I had the power, forget.“Good-night!” and happy, dearest, be thy morrow⁠—From gloom and sadness be thy future free;Be mine alone the darkness and the sorrow⁠—For wherethouart not, all is night to me.

“Good-night!” the words were spoken, and we parted,Ito my lonely home, to muse on thee,With spirit bowed and saddened, broken-hearted⁠—Andthou, to dreams of joy—but not of me.

“Good-night!” the words were spoken, and we parted,

Ito my lonely home, to muse on thee,

With spirit bowed and saddened, broken-hearted⁠—

Andthou, to dreams of joy—but not of me.

“Good-night!” how very coldly it was spoken;But those loved tones are lingering near me yet,And though of tenderness they bring no token,I would not, if I had the power, forget.

“Good-night!” how very coldly it was spoken;

But those loved tones are lingering near me yet,

And though of tenderness they bring no token,

I would not, if I had the power, forget.

“Good-night!” and happy, dearest, be thy morrow⁠—From gloom and sadness be thy future free;Be mine alone the darkness and the sorrow⁠—For wherethouart not, all is night to me.

“Good-night!” and happy, dearest, be thy morrow⁠—

From gloom and sadness be thy future free;

Be mine alone the darkness and the sorrow⁠—

For wherethouart not, all is night to me.

JASPER ST. AUBYN;

OR THE COURSE OF PASSION.

———

BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT.

———

(Continued from page 91.)

The morning was still very young, and the sun, which was but just beginning to rise above the brow of the eastern hill, poured his long, yellow rays, full of a million dusty motes, in almost level lines down the soft, green slopes, diversified by hundreds of cool purple shadows, projected far and wide over the laughing landscape, from every tree and bush that intercepted the mild light.

The dews of the preceding night still clustered unexhaled, sparkling like diamonds to the morning beams, on every leaf and flower; a soft west wind was playing gently with the thousands of bright buds and blossoms which decked the pleasant gardens; and the whole air was perfumed with the delicate fragrance of the mignionette and roses, which filled the luxuriant parterres. The hum of the reveling bees came to the ear with a sweet domestic sound, and the rich carol of the blackbird and the thrush came swelling from the tangled shrubberies, full fraught with gratitude and glee.

It was into such a scene, and among such sights and sounds, that the young free-trader wandered forth from the tranquillity and gloom of the sick chamber in which he had spent a sleepless night; but his mind had been too deeply stirred by his conversation with Sir Miles St. Aubyn, and chords of too powerful feeling had been thrilled into sudden and painful life, to allow him to be penetrated, as he might have been in a less agitated hour, by the sweet influences of the time and season.

Still, though he was unconscious of the pleasant sights and sounds and smells which surrounded him, as he strolled slowly through the bowery walks of the old garden, they had more or less effect upon his perturbed and bitter spirit; and his mood became gradually softer, as he mused upon what had passed within the last hour, alone in that bright solitude.

Wild and impetuous and almost fierce by nature, he had brooded from his very boyhood upward over his real and imaginary wrongs, until the iron had so deeply pierced his soul, that he could see nothing but coldness, and hostility, and persecution in the conduct of all around him, with the exception of his old student uncle and his sweet Theresa. Ever suspecting, ever anticipating injury and insult, or at least coldness and repulsion from all with whom he was brought into contact, he actually generated in the breasts of others the feelings which he imputed to them all unjustly. Accusing the world of injustice or ere it was unjust, in the end he made it to be so indeed; and then hated it, and railed against it, for that which it had never dreamed of, but for his own fantastic waywardness.

It was unfortunate for Durzil, that the good man, into whose care he had fallen, ever of a philosophical and studious, nay, even mystic disposition, had become, since the sad fate of his beloved sister, and the early death of a yet dearer wife, so wholly visionary, so entirely given up to the wildest theorizing, the most abstruse and abstract metaphysical inquiries, that no one could have been devised less fitting for the guardian and instructor of a high-spirited, hot-headed, fiery boy than he was.

The consequence of this was, as it might have been expected, that disgusted early with the strange sorts of learning which the old man persisted in forcing into him against the grain, and discontented with the stillness and deathlike tranquillity of all around him, the boy ran away from his distasteful home, and shipped for the India voyage in a free-trader, half merchantman, half-picaroon, before he had yet attained his thirteenth year. In that wild and turbulent career, well suited to his daring and contemptuous spirit, he had, as he himself expressed it, become hardened and inured not to toils and sufferings only, but to thoughts and feelings, habits and opinions, which perhaps now could never be eradicated from his nature, of which they had become, as it were, part and parcel.

When he returned, well nigh a man in years, and quite a man in stature, and perhaps more than most men in courage, resource, coolness and audacity, old Allan, to whom he had written once or twice, apprising him that he had adopted the sea as his home and his profession, received him with a hearty welcome, and with few or no inquiries as to the period during which he had been absent.

Thereafter, he came and went as he would, unasked and unheeded. When he was ashore, the cottage by the fords of Widecomb was his home; and his increasing wealth—for he had prospered greatly in his adventurous career—added materially to the comforts of old Allan’s housekeeping. His life was, therefore, spent in strange alternations; now amid the wildest excitement—the storm, the chase, the fierce and frantic speculation, the perilous and desperate fight, the revelry, the triumph, and the booty; and now, in the calmest and most peaceful solitude, amid the sweetest pastoral scenery, and with the loveliest and most innocent companion that ever soothed the hot and eager spirit of erring and impetuous man, into almost woman’s softness.

And hence it was, perhaps, that Durzil Bras-de-fer had, as it were, two different natures—one fierce, rash, bitter, scornful, heedless of human praise or human censure, pitiless to human sorrow, reckless of human life, merciless, almost cruel—the other generous, andsoft, and sympathetic, and full of every good and gentle impulse.

And it was in the latter of these only, that Theresa Allan knew him.

It must not be supposed from what I have written, that Durzil was a pirate, or a buccaneer—far from it. For though, at times, he and his comrades assumed the initiative in warfare, and smote the Spaniards and the Dutchmen, and the French unsparingly, beyond the Line, and made but small distinction between themeumand thetuum, especially if thetuumpertained to the stranger and the papist, still neither public opinion, nor their own consciences condemned them—they were regarded, as Cavendish, and Raleigh, and Drake, and Frobisher and Hawkins had been, a reign or two before, as bold, headlong adventurers; perhaps a little lawless, but on the whole, noble and daring men, and were esteemed in general rather an ornament than a disgrace to their native land.

As men are esteemed of men, such they are very apt to be or to become; and, having the repute of chivalrous spirit, of generosity and worth, no less than of dauntless courage, and rare seamanship, the adventurous free-traders of that day held themselves to be, in all respects, gentlemen, and men of honor; and holding themselves so, for the most part they became so.

It was, therefore, by no means either wonderful or an exception to a rule, that Durzil Bras-de-fer should have been such as I have described him, awake to gentle impulses, alive to good impressions, easily subject to the influences of the finest female society, and in no respect a person either from his habits, his tastes, or his profession to be rejected by men of honor, or eschewed by women of refinement.

And now, as he followed slowly on the steps of his beautiful cousin, the young man was more alive than usual to the higher and nobler sensibilities of his mind. The information which he had gained concerning his own father’s feelings, at the moment of his death, had greatly softened him, and it began to occur to him—which was, indeed, true—that he might have been during his whole life conjuring up phantoms against which to do battle, and attributing thoughts and actions to the world at large, of which the world might well be wholly innocent.

Up to this moment, although he had long been aware of his constantly increasing passion for his fair cousin, he had rested content with the mild and sisterlike affection which she had ever manifested toward him; and, having been ever her sole companion, ever treated with most perfect confidence and sympathy, having found her at all times charmed to greet his return, and grieved at his departure; knowing, above all things, that at the very worst he had no rival, and that her heart had never been touched by any warmer passion than she felt toward himself, he had scarcely paused to inquire even of himself, whether he was beloved in turn, much less had he endeavored to penetrate the secrets of her heart, or to disturb the calm tenor of her way by words or thoughts of passion.

Now, however, the words, the questions of the old cavalier had awakened many a doubt in his soul; and with the doubt came the desire irrepressible to envisage his fate, to learn and ascertain, once and for all, whether his lot was to be cast henceforth in joy or in sorrow; whether, in a word, he was to be a wanderer and an outcast, by sea and by land, unto his dying day, or whether this very hour was to be to him the commencement of a new era, a new life.

Now, as he walked forth in the beautiful calm morning, in that old, pleasant garden, which had been the scene of so much peaceable and innocent enjoyment, he felt himself at once a sadder and a better man than he had ever been before; and while determined to delay no longer, but to try his gentle cousin’s heart, he was supported by no high and fiery hope; he seemed to have lost, he knew not how or wherefore, that proud heaven-reaching confidence, which was wont to count all things won while they were yet to win, still less did his heart kindle and blaze out with that preconceived indignation at the idea of being unappreciated or neglected, which would a few hours before have goaded him almost to frenzy.

I have written much of his character to little purpose, if it be not plain that humility was the frame of mind least usual to the youthful seaman, yet now, for once, he was humble. He had discovered, for the first time in his life, that he had erred grossly in his estimate of others, and was beginning to suspect that that false estimate had led him far away from true principles, true conceptions; he was beginning, in a word, to suspect that he was himselflesssinned against than sinning; and that his was, in fact, a very much misguided and distempered spirit.

He clasped his brow closely with a feverish and trembling hand, as he walked onward slowly, pondering, with his whole soul intent upon the future and the past. He was inquiring of himself, “Does she, can she love me?” and he could make no answer to his own passionate questioning. While he was in this mood, bending his steps toward the favorite bower wherein he half hoped half feared to find Theresa, a soft voice fell upon his ear, and a light hand was laid upon his arm, as he passed the intersection of another shady walk with that through which he was strolling.

“Good-morrow, Durzil,” said the young girl, merrily. “I never thought to see you out so early in the garden; but I am glad that you are here, for I want you. So come along with me at once, and tell me if it be not a nest of young nightingales which I have found in the thick syringa bush beside my arbor. Come, Durzil, don’t you hear me? Why what ails you, that you look so sad, and move so heavily this glorious summer morning? You are not ill, are you, dear Durzil?”

“Dear Durzil,” he repeated, in a low, subdued tone. “DearDurzil! I would to God that I were dear to you, Theresa—that I were dear to any one.”

So singular was the desponding tone in which he spoke, so strange and unwonted was the cloud of deep depression which sat on his bold, intelligent brow, that the young girl stared at him in amazement, almost in alarm.

“You are ill,” she cried, in tones of affectionate anxiety; “you must be ill, or you would never speak so strangely, so unkindly; or is it only that you areoverdone with watching by that poor youth’s sick bed? Yet no, no, that can never be, you who are so strong and so hardy. What is it, dearest cousin? Tell me, what is it makes you speak so wildly—would that youweredear to me! why, if not you,youand my good, kind father, who on the face of the wide earth is dear to poor Theresa! That you were dear to any one! You, whom my father looks upon and loves as his own son; you, whose companions hold you as almost more than mortal—for have I not marked the inscriptions on your sabre’s guard, and on the telescope they gave you? You, who have saved the lives of so many fellow mortals; you, to whom those ladies, rescued at Darien from the bloodthirsty Spaniards, addressed such glowing words of gratitude and love; you, cousin Durzil,you, who are so great, so brave, so wise, so skillful, and above all, so generous and kind;youtalk of wishing you were dear to any one! Good sooth! you must be dreaming, or you are bewitched, gentle Durzil.”

“If I be,” he replied with a smile, for her high spirits and gay enthusiasm aroused him from his gloomier thoughts, and began to enkindle brighter hopes in his bosom, “if I be, thou, Theresa, art the enchantress who has done it.”

“Ay! now you are more like yourself; but tell me,” she said, caressingly, “what was it made you sad and dark but now?”

“Only this, dear Theresa, that I am again about to leave you.”

“To leave us—to leave us so soon and so suddenly. Why you have been here but three little weeks, which have passed like so many days, and when you came you said that you would stay with us till autumn. Oh, dear! my father will be so grieved at your going. You do not know, you do not dream how much he loves you, Durzil. He is a different person altogether when you are at home—so much gayer, and more sociable! Oh! wherefore must you leave us so quickly, and after so long an absence, too, as your last? Oh, truly, it is unkind, Durzil.”

“And you, Theresa, shall you be sorry?”

“I will not answer you,” she replied, half petulantly, half tearfully. “It is unkind of you to go, and doubly unkind of you to speak to me thus. What have I done to you now, what have I ever done to you, that you should doubt my being sorry. Are not you the only friend, the only companion I have got in the wide world? Are you not as near and dear to me, as if you were my own brother? Do not I love you as my brother, even as my father loves you as his son? Ah, Durzil! if you are never less loved than you are by poor Theresa Allan, you will ne’er need to complain for lack of loving.”

And she burst into tears as she ended her rapid speech; for she did not comprehend in the least at what he was aiming, and her innocent and artless heart was wounded by what she fancied to be a doubt of her affection.

“And if you feel so deeply the mere temporary absence which my profession forces on me, Theresa, how, think you, should you feel were that absence to be eternal?”

“Eternal!” she exclaimed, turning very pale. “Eternal! What do you mean by eternal?”

“It may well be so, Theresa; and yet it rests with yourself, after all, whether I go or not—and yet be sure of this, if I do go, I go forever.”

“Withme—does it rest withme?” she cried, joyously. “Oh! if it rests with me, you will not go at all—you will never go any more. I am always in terror while you are absent; and the west wind never blows, howling as it does over these desolate bare hills, with its mournful, moaning voice, which they say is the very sound of a spirit’s cry, but it conjures up to my mind all dread ideas of the tremendous rush and roar of the mountain billows upon some rock-bound leeward coast, as I have heard you tell by thecheerful hearth; and of stranded vessels, creaking and groaning as their huge ribs break asunder, and of corpses weltering on the ruthless waves; oh! such dread day-dreams! If it rest with me, go you shall not, Durzil, ever again to sea. And why should you? You have won fame enough, and glory and wealth more than enough to supply your wants so long as you live. Why should you go to sea again, dear Durzil?”

“I willnotgo again, Theresa, if such seriously be your deliberate desire.”

“If such seriously be my deliberate desire!” the fair girl repeated the words after him, with a sort of half solemn drollery. Was it the native instinct of the female heart, betraying itself in that innocent and artless creature, scarcely in years more than a child—the inborn, irrepressible coquetry of the sex, foreseeing what was about to follow from the young man’s lips, yet seeking all unconsciously to delay the avowal, to protract the uncertainty, the excitement, or was it genuine, unsuspecting innocence? “You are most singularly solemn,” she continued, “this fine morning, Durzil, wondrously serious and deliberate; and so, as you are so precise, I must, I suppose, answer you likewise in due set form. Of course, it is my desire to have the company of one whom I esteem and love, of one to whom I look up for countenance and protection, of my only relative on earth, except my dear old father, as much as I can have it, with due regard to his interests and well-being. My father is getting very old, too, and infirm; and at times I fancy that his mind wanders. I cannot fail, therefore, to perceive that he needs a more able and energetic person near him than I am. I can, moreover, see no good cause why you should persist in following so perilous and stormy a profession, unless it be that you love it. Therefore, as I have said, ofcourse, if it rest with me to detain you, I would do so—but always under this proviso, that it were with your own good will; for I confess, dear Durzil, that I fear, if you were detained against your wish, if you still pant for the strong excitement, the stormy rapture, as I have heard you call it, of the chase, the battle, and the tempest, you never could be happy here, whatever we might do to please you. Now, Durzil, seriously and deliberately, you are answered.”

“I could be happy here. I am weary of agitation and excitement. I feel that I have erred—that the path I have taken leads not to happiness. I wanttranquillity, repose of the heart, above all things—love!”

“Then do not go—then I say positively, Durzil, dear Durzil, stay with us—you can find all these here.”

“Are you sure—all of them?”

“Sure? Why, if not here in this delicious, pastoral, simple country, in this dear cottage, with its lovely garden and calm waters, where in the world should you find tranquillity, if not here, in the midst of your best friends, in the bosom of your own family, where should you look for love?”

“Theresa, there be more kinds of love than one—and that I crave is not cold, duteous, family affection.”

Now, for the first time, it seemed that the young man’s meaning broke clearly upon her mind; now a sudden and bright illumination burst upon all that seemed strange and wild and inconsistent in his conduct, in his speech, in his very silence. Unsuspected before, it was now evident to her at once that deep, overmastering passion was the cause to which she must refer all that had been for some time past to her an incomprehensible enigma in her cousin’s demeanor.

And now that she was assured, for the first time in her life, that she was really, deeply, ardently beloved—not as a pretty, childish playmate, not as an amiable and dear relative, but as herself, for herself, a lovable and lovely woman, how did the maiden’s heart respond to the great revelation?

Elevated on the instant from the girl to the woman, a strange and thrilling sense, a sort of moral shock affected her whole system—was it of pleasure or of pain?

It has been often said, and I presume said truly, that no woman—no, not the best and purest, the most modest and considerate of their sex—ever receive a declaration of love from any man, even if the man himself be distasteful to her, even if the love he proffer be illicit and dishonest, without a secret and instinctive sense of high gratification, a consciousness of power, of triumph, a pride in the homage paid to her charms, a sort of gratitude for the tribute rendered to her sex’s loveliness. She may, and will, repulse the dishonorable love with scorn and loathing, yet still, though she may spurn the worthless offering, and heap reproach upon the daring offerer, still she will be half pleased by the offer—if it be only that she has had the power, the pleasure—for all power is pleasure—of rejecting it. She may, and will, gently, considerately, sympathetically decline the honest offers of a pure love which she cannot reciprocate or value as it should be valued; but even if he who made the tender be repulsive, almost odious, still she must be gratified, perhaps almost grateful for that which he has done.

To a young girl more especially, just bursting from the bud into the bloom of young womanhood, scarce conscious yet that she is a woman, scarcely awake to the sense of her own powers, her own passions—a creature full of vague, shadowy, mysterious fancies, strange uncomprehended thoughts, and half perceived desires, there is—there must be something of wondrous influence, of indescribable excitement in the receiving a first declaration.

And so it was with Theresa Allan. She was, in truth, no angel—for angels are not to be met with in the daily walks of this world—she was, indeed, neither more nor less than a mere mortal woman, mortal in all the imperfection, and narrowness, and feebleness, and inability to rise even to the height of its own best aspirations, which are peculiar to mortality—woman in all the frailty and vanity and variety, no less than in all the tenderness, the truth, the constancy, the loveliness, the sweetness of true womanhood. She was, in a word, just what a great modern poet has described in those sweet lines,

“A creature not too bright or goodFor human nature’s daily food;For transient sorrows, simple wiles,Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and smiles.”

“A creature not too bright or good

For human nature’s daily food;

For transient sorrows, simple wiles,

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and smiles.”

and no one who is a true judge of human, and yet more of woman nature will regret that she was such; for he must be a poor judge indeed, he must know little of the real character of womanhood, who does not feel that one half of her best influences, one half of her sweetest power of charming, soothing, controling, winding herself about the very heart-strings, arises from her very imperfections. Take from her these, and what she might then be we know not, but she would not be woman, and until the world has seen something better and more endearing, until a wiser artificer can be found thanHewho made her, even as she is, a help meet for man—away with your abstractions! give her to us as she is, at least if not perfect, the best and brightest of created things—a very, very woman.

She heard his words, she felt his meaning, yet the sense of the words seemed to be lost, the very sounds rang in her ears dizzily, her breath came so painfully that she almost fancied she was choking, the earth appeared to shake under her feet, and every thing around her to wheel drunkenly to and fro.

She pressed one hand upon her heart, and caught her cousin’s arm with the other to support herself. Her whole face, which a moment before had been alive and radiant with the warm hues of happiness and youth, became as white as marble. Her very lips were bloodless; her whole frame trembled as if she had an ague fit.

He gazed on her in wonder, almost in terror. For a moment he thought that she was about to faint, almost to die; and so violent, in truth, was the affection of her nerves, that, had she not been relieved by a sudden passion of tears, it is doubtful what might have been the result.

They were standing when Durzil Bras-de-fer uttered the words which had wrought so singular a change in Theresa’s manner, within a pace or two of the sylvan bower, of which she had spoken, and without a moment’s pause, or a syllable uttered, he hurried her into its quiet recess, and placing her gently on the mossy seat within, knelt down at her feet, holding her left hand in his own, and gazing up anxiously in her face.

He was amazed—he was alarmed. Not for himself alone, not from the selfish fear of losing what he most prized on earth—but for her.

He knew not, indeed, whether that strange and almost terrible revulsion arose from pleasure or from pain. He knew not, could not even conjecture whether it boded good or evil to his hopes, to his happiness. But the scales had fallen from his eyes in an instant. Hehad discovered now, what her old father, recognizing genius with the intuitive second-sight of kindred genius, had perceived long before that this young, artless, inexperienced, child-like girl, was, indeed, a creature wonderfully and fearfully made.

He had never before suspected that beneath that calm, gentle, tranquil, unexciteable exterior there beat a heart, there thrilled a soul full of the strongest capabilities, the most earnest aspirations, the most intense imaginings, that ever were awakened by the magic touch of love, into those overwhelming passions, which can tend to middle state, but must lead to the perfect happiness or utter misery of their possessor.

But he saw it, he knew it now; and he felt that so soon as the present paroxysm should pass over, she too would feel and know all this likewise. Whether for good or for evil, for weal or for wo, he perceived that he had unlocked for her whom he truly and singly loved, the hitherto sealed fountain of knowledge.

And he almost shuddered at the thought of what he had done—he almost wished that he had stifled his own wishes, sacrificed his own hopes.

For though impetuous and impulsive, though in some degree warped and perverted, he was not selfish. And when he observed the terrible power which his words had produced upon her, and judged thence of the character and temper of her mind and intellect, a sad suspicion fell upon him that hers was one of those over delicate temperaments, one of those spirits too rarely endowed, too sensitively constituted ever to know again, when once awakened to self-consciousness, that quietude in which alone lies true happiness.

Several minutes passed before a word was spoken by either. But gradually the color returned to her lips, to her checks, and the light relumed her beautiful blue eyes, and the tremor passed away from her slight frame; but her face continued motionless, and so calm that its gravity almost amounted to severity. It was not altogether melancholy, it was not at all anger, but it was, what in a harder and less youthful face would have been sternness. Never before had he seen such an expression on any human face—never, assuredly, had hers worn it before. It was the awakening of a new spirit—the consciousness of a new power—the first struggling into life of a great purpose.

Her hand lay passive in his grasp, yet he could feel the pulses throbbing to the very tips of those small, rosy fingers, so strongly and tumultuously, that he could not reconcile such evidence of her quick and lively feeling with the fixed tranquillity of the eye which was bent upon his own, with the rigidity of the marble brow.

At length, and contrary to what is wont to happen, it was he who first broke silence.

“Theresa,” he said, “I have grieved—I have pained—perhaps offended you.”

And then she started, as his voice smote her ears, so complete had been the abstraction of her mind, and recovering all her faculties and readiness of mind on the instant,

“Yes, Durzil,” she said, very sweetly, but very sorrowfully, “you have grieved me, you have pained me, very, very deeply; but oh, do not imagine that you have offended—that you could offend me. No; you have torn away too suddenly, too roughly, the veil that covered my eyes and my heart. You have awakened thoughts, and feelings, and perceptions in my soul, of whose existence I never dreamed before. You have made me know myself as it were, better within the last few minutes than I ever knew myself before. It seems to me, that I have lived longer and felt more, since we have sat here together, than in all the years I can count before. And, oh, my heart! my heart! I am most unhappy.”

“You cannot love me, then, Theresa,” he said, tranquilly; for he had vast self-control, and he was too much of a man to suffer his own agitation or distress to agitate or distress her further. “You cannot love me as I would be loved by you—you cannot be mine.”

“Durzil,” she said, in tones full of the deepest emotion, “until the moment in which you spoke to me, I never thought of love, I never dreamed or imagined to myself what it should be, other than the love I bear to my father, to you, to all that is kind, and good, and beautiful in humanity or in nature. But your words, I know not how nor wherefore, have awakened me, as it were, into a strange sort of knowledge. I donotlove, I almost hope that I never may love, as you would wish me to love you; but I do feelnowthat I know what such love should be; and I tremble at the knowledge. I feel that it would be too strong, too full of fear, of anxiety, of agony, to allow of happiness. Oh, no, no! Durzil, do not ask me, do not wish me to love you so; pray, rather pray for me to God rather, that I may never love at all—for so surely as I do love, I know that I shall be a wretched, wretched woman!”

That was a strange scene, and it passed between a strange pair. Great influences had been at work in the minds of both within the last few hours, and it would have been very difficult to say in which the greatest change had been wrought.

In her, the tranquil, innocent, unconscious girl had been aroused into the powerful, passionate, thoughtful woman. A knowledge of that whereof she had been most ignorant before “her glassy essence” had awakened her, as the breeze awakens the lake from repose into power.

In him, the violent, hot-headed, stubborn, and impetuous man of action had been tamed down by a conversion almost as sudden and convincing into the slow, self-controlled, self-denying man of counsel. As the discovery of power had aroused her into life, so had the discovery of long cherished, long injurious error, tamed him into tranquillity.

One day ago he would have raved furiously, or brooded sullenly and darkly over her words. Now, even with the fit of passion all puissant over him, with the wild heat of love burning within his breast, with the keen sense of disappointment wringing him, he had yet force of temper to control himself, nay, more, he had force of mind enough to see and apprehend, thatthisTheresa, was no longer the Theresa whom he loved; and that, although he still adored her, it was impossible either for him to meet the aspirations of her glowing and inspired genius, or for her to be to him what he had dreamed of, the tranquillizing, soothing spirit which should pour balm upon his wounded,restless, irritable feelings—the wife, whose first, best gift to him should be repose and tranquillity of soul.

He pressed her hand tenderly, and said, as he might have done to a dear sister,

“I have been to blame, Theresa. I have given you pain, rashly, but not wantonly. Forgive me, for you are the last person in the world to whom I would give even a moment’s uneasiness. I did not suspect this, dear little girl. I did not dream that you were so nervous, or moved so easily; but you must not yield to such feelings—such impulses, for it is only by yielding to them that they will gain power over you, and make you, indeed, an unhappy woman. You shall see, Theresa, how patiently I will bear my disappointment—for that it is a disappointment, and a very bitter one, I shall not deny—and how I will be happy in spite of it, and all for love of you. And in return, Theresa, if you love poor Durzil, as you say you do, as your true friend and your brother, you will control these foolish fancies of your little head, which you imagine to be feelings of your heart, and I shall one day, I doubt not, have the pleasure of seeing you not only a very happy woman, but a very happy wife.”

“Oh, you are good, Durzil,” she said, tearfully and gently. “Oh, you are very good and noble. Why—why cannot I—” and she interrupted herself suddenly, and covering her eyes with both her hands, wept silently and softly for several minutes. And he spoke not to her the while, nor even sought to soothe, for he well knew that tears were the best solace to an over-wrought over-excited spirit.

After a little while, as he expected, she recovered herself altogether, and looking up in his face with a wan and watery smile.

“You are not hurt, you are not wounded by what I have done,” she said, “dear Durzil. You do not fancy that I do not perceive, do not feel, and esteem, and love all your great, and good, and generous, and noble qualities. I am a foolish, weak little girl—I am not worthy of you; I could not, I know I could not make you happy, even if I could—if I could—if—you know what I would say, Durzil.”

“If you could be happy with me yourself,” he answered, smiling in his turn, and without an effort, although his smile was pensive and sad likewise. “No, my Theresa, I am not hurt nor wounded. I am grieved, it is true, I cannot but be grieved at the dissipating of a pleasant dream, at the vanishing of a hope long indulged, long cherished—a hope which has been a solace to me in many a moment of pain and trial, a sweet companion in many a midnight watch. But I am neither hurt nor wounded; for you have never given me any reason to form so bold, so unwarranted hope, and you have given me now all that you can give me, sympathy and kindness. Our hearts, our affections, I well know, let men say what they will, are not our own to give—and a true woman can but do what you have done. Moreover, even with the sorrow and regret which I feel at this moment, there is mingled a conviction that you are doing what is both wise and right; for although you have all within yourself, though you are all that would make me, or a far better man than I, ay, the best man who ever breathed the breath of life, supremely happy; still, if you could not be happy with me, and in me yourself—how could I be so?”

She looked up at him again, and now, with an altered expression, for there was less of sadness and more of surprise, more of respect for the man who spoke so composedly, so well, in a moment of such trial, on her fair features. Perhaps, too, there might have been a shadow of regret—could it be of regret that he did not feel more acutely the loss which he had undergone? If there were such a feeling in her mind—for she was woman—it was transient as the lightning of a summer’s night—it was gone before she had time even to reproach herself for its momentary existence.

“You are astonished,” he said, interpreting her glance, almost before she knew that he had observed it, “you are astonished that I should be so calm, who am by nature so quick and headlong. But I, too, have learned much to-day—have learned much of my own nature, of my own infirmities, of my own errors—and with me to learn that these exist, is to resolve to conquer them. I have learned first, Theresa, that my father, whom I have ever been forced to regard as my worst enemy, died conscious of the wrong he had done me—done my mother—and penitent, and full of love and of sorrow for us both. And therein have I convicted myself of one great error, committed, indeed, through ignorance, which has, however, been the cause, the source of many other errors—which has led me to charge the world with injustice, when I was myself unjust rather to the world, which has made me guilty of the great offence, the great crime of hating my brother men, when I should have pitied them, and loved them. Therefore I will be wayward no more, nor rash, nor reckless. I will make one conquest at least—that of myself and of my own passions.”

“I know—I know,” said the girl, suddenly blushing very deeply, “that you are every thing that is good and great; every thing that men ought to admire and women to love, and yet—”

“And yet you cannot love me. Well, think no more of that, Theresa. Forget—”

“Never! never!” she exclaimed, clasping her hands eagerly together. “I never can forget what you have made me feel, what I must have made yousufferthis day.”

“Well, if it be so, remember it, Theresa; but remember it only thus. That if you have quenched my love, if you destroyed my hope, you have but added to my regard, to my affection. Promise me that whereever you may be, however, or with whomsoever your lot shall be cast, you will always remember me as your friend, your brother; you will always call on me at your slightest need, as on one who would shed his heart’s blood to win you a moment’s happiness.”

“I will—I will,” she cried affectionately, fervently. “On whom else should I call. And God only knows,” she added, mournfully, “how soon I shall need a protector. But will you,” she continued, catching both his hands in her own, “will you be happy, Durzil?”

“I will,” he replied, firmly, returning the gentle pressure, “I will, at least in so far as it rests with man to be so, in despite of fortune. But mark me, dearTheresa, if you would have me be so, you can even yet do much toward rendering me so.”

“Can I—then tell me, tell me how, and it is done already.”

“By letting me see thatyouare happy.”

“Alas!” and again she clasped her hand hard over her heart, as if to still its violent beating. “Alas! Durzil.”

“And why, alas! Theresa?”

“Can we be happy at our own will?”

“Independently of great woes, great calamities, which we may not control, which are sent to us for wise ends from above—surely, I say, surely we can.”

“And can you, Durzil?”

“Theresa,thisis to me a great wo—yea, a great calamity; and yet I reply, ay! after a time, after the bitterness shall be overpast, I can, and more, I will. Much more, then, can you, who have never felt, who I trust and believe will never meet any such wo or grief—much more can you be happy. Wherefore should you not, foolish child—have you not been happy hitherto? What have you, that you should not be happy now?”

“Nothing,” she replied, faintly. “I have nothing why I should be unhappy, unless it be, if I have made you so.”

“Theresa, you have not—you shall see that you have not—made me unhappy.”

“And yet, Durzil, yet I feel a foreboding that I shall be, that I must be unhappy. A want—I feel a want of something here.”

“You are excited, agitated now; all this has been too much for your spirits, for your nerves; and I think, Theresa, I am sure that you are too much alone—you think, or rather you muse and dream, which are not healthy modes of thinking—too much in solitude. I will speak to my uncle about that before I go—”

“Before you go!” she interrupted him, quickly. “Go, whither?”

“To sea. To my ship, Theresa.”

“Then youarehurt, then youareangry with me. Then I have no influence over you.”

“Cease, cease, Theresa. It is better, it is necessary—I must go for awhile, until I have weaned myself from this desperate feeling, until I shall have accustomed myself to think of you, to regard you as a sister only; until I shall have schooled myself so far as to be able to contemplate you without agony as not only not being mine—but being another’s.”

“Would it—would it be agony to you, Durzil? Then mark me, I never, never will be another’s.”

“Madness!” he answered, firmly; “madness and wickedness, too, Theresa. Neither man or woman were intended by the great Maker to be solitary beings. God forbid, if you cannot be mine, that I should be so selfish as to wish your life barren, and your heart loveless. No; love, Theresa, when you can, only love wisely; and the day shall come when it will add to my happiness to see and know you happy in the love of one whom you can love, and who shall love you as you must be loved. Never speak again as you did but now, Theresa. And now, dearest girl, I will leave you. Rest yourself awhile, and compose yourself, and then go if you will to your good father.”

“Shall I—shall I tell him,” she faltered, “what has passed between us?”

“As you will, as you judge best, Theresa. I am no advocate for concealment, still less for deceit—but here there is none of the latter, and to tell him this might grieve his kind spirit.”

“You are wise—you are good. God bless you.”

“And you, Theresa,” and he passed his arm calmly across her shoulder, and bending over, pressed his lips, calmly as a father’s kiss on her pure brow. “Fare you well.”

“You are not going—going to leave us now?”

“Not to-day—not to-day, Theresa.”

“Nor to-morrow?” she said, beseechingly.

“Nor to-morrow,” he replied, after a moment’s hesitation, “but soon. Now compose yourself, my dear little girl. Farewell, and God bless you.”

——

The Parting.

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