There are countless fields, the green earth o'er,Where the verdant turf has been dyed with gore;Where hostile ranks, in their grim array,With the battle's smoke have obscured the day;Where hate was stamped on each rigid face,As foe met foe in the death embrace;Where the groans of the wounded and dying roseTill the heart of the listener with horror froze,And the wide expanse of crimsoned plainWas piled with heaps of uncounted slain—But a fiercer combat, a deadlier strife,Is that which is waged in the Battle of Life.The hero that wars on the tented field,With his shining sword and his burnished shield,Goes not alone with his faithful brand:—Friends and comrades around him stand,The trumpets sound and the war-steeds neighTo join in the shock of the coming fray;And he flies to the onset, he charges the foe,Where the bayonets gleam and the red tides flow,And he bears his part in that conflict direWith an arm all nerve and a heart all fire.What though he fall? At the battle's close,In the flush of the victory won, he goesWith martial music—and waving plume—From a field of fame—to a laureled tomb!But the hero that wars in the Battle of LifeMust stand alone in the fearful strife;Alone in his weakness or strength must go,Hero or coward, to meet the foe:He may not fly; on that fated fieldHe must win or lose, he must conquer or yield.Warrior—who com'st to this battle now,With a careless step and a thoughtless brow,As if the day were already won—Pause, and gird all thy armor on!Dost thou bring with thee hither a dauntless will—An ardent soul that no fear can chill—Thy shield of faith hast thou tried and proved—Canst thou say to the mountain "be thou moved"—In thy hand does the sword of Truth flame bright—Is thy banner inscribed—"For God and the Right"—In the might of prayer dost thou wrestle and plead?Never had warrior greater need!Unseen foes in thy pathway hide,Thou art encompassed on every side.There Pleasure waits with her siren train,Her poisen flowers and her hidden chain;Flattery courts with her hollow smiles,Passion with silvery tone beguiles,Love and Friendship their charmed spells weave;Trust not too deeply—they may deceive!Hope with her Dead Sea fruits is there,Sin is spreading her gilded snare,Disease with a ruthless hand would smite,And Care spread o'er thee her withering blight.Hate and Envy, with visage black,And the serpent Slander, are on thy track;Falsehood and Guilt, Remorse and Pride,Doubt and Despair, in thy pathway glide;Haggard Want, in her demon joy,Waits to degrade thee and then destroy;And Death, the insatiate, is hovering nearTo snatch from thy grasp all thou holdest dear.In war with these phantoms that gird thee roundNo limbs dissevered may strew the ground;No blood may flow, and no mortal earThe groans of the wounded heart may hear,As it struggles and writhes in their dread control,As the iron enters the riven soul.But the youthful form grows wasted and weak,And sunken and wan is the rounded cheek,The brow is furrowed, but not with years,The eye is dimmed with its secret tears,And streaked with white is the raven hair;These are the tokens of conflict there.The battle is ended; the hero goesWorn and scarred to his last repose.He has won the day, he conquered doom,He has sunk unknown to his nameless tomb.For the victor's glory, no voice may plead,Fame has no echo and earth no meed.But the guardian angels are hovering near,They have watched unseen o'er the conflict here,And they bear him now on their wings away,To a realm of peace, to a cloudless day.Ended now is earthly strife,And his brow is crowned with the Crown of Life!
There are countless fields, the green earth o'er,Where the verdant turf has been dyed with gore;Where hostile ranks, in their grim array,With the battle's smoke have obscured the day;Where hate was stamped on each rigid face,As foe met foe in the death embrace;Where the groans of the wounded and dying roseTill the heart of the listener with horror froze,And the wide expanse of crimsoned plainWas piled with heaps of uncounted slain—But a fiercer combat, a deadlier strife,Is that which is waged in the Battle of Life.
The hero that wars on the tented field,With his shining sword and his burnished shield,Goes not alone with his faithful brand:—Friends and comrades around him stand,The trumpets sound and the war-steeds neighTo join in the shock of the coming fray;And he flies to the onset, he charges the foe,Where the bayonets gleam and the red tides flow,And he bears his part in that conflict direWith an arm all nerve and a heart all fire.What though he fall? At the battle's close,In the flush of the victory won, he goesWith martial music—and waving plume—From a field of fame—to a laureled tomb!But the hero that wars in the Battle of LifeMust stand alone in the fearful strife;Alone in his weakness or strength must go,Hero or coward, to meet the foe:He may not fly; on that fated fieldHe must win or lose, he must conquer or yield.
Warrior—who com'st to this battle now,With a careless step and a thoughtless brow,As if the day were already won—Pause, and gird all thy armor on!Dost thou bring with thee hither a dauntless will—An ardent soul that no fear can chill—Thy shield of faith hast thou tried and proved—Canst thou say to the mountain "be thou moved"—In thy hand does the sword of Truth flame bright—Is thy banner inscribed—"For God and the Right"—In the might of prayer dost thou wrestle and plead?Never had warrior greater need!Unseen foes in thy pathway hide,Thou art encompassed on every side.There Pleasure waits with her siren train,Her poisen flowers and her hidden chain;Flattery courts with her hollow smiles,Passion with silvery tone beguiles,Love and Friendship their charmed spells weave;Trust not too deeply—they may deceive!Hope with her Dead Sea fruits is there,Sin is spreading her gilded snare,Disease with a ruthless hand would smite,And Care spread o'er thee her withering blight.Hate and Envy, with visage black,And the serpent Slander, are on thy track;Falsehood and Guilt, Remorse and Pride,Doubt and Despair, in thy pathway glide;Haggard Want, in her demon joy,Waits to degrade thee and then destroy;And Death, the insatiate, is hovering nearTo snatch from thy grasp all thou holdest dear.
In war with these phantoms that gird thee roundNo limbs dissevered may strew the ground;No blood may flow, and no mortal earThe groans of the wounded heart may hear,As it struggles and writhes in their dread control,As the iron enters the riven soul.But the youthful form grows wasted and weak,And sunken and wan is the rounded cheek,The brow is furrowed, but not with years,The eye is dimmed with its secret tears,And streaked with white is the raven hair;These are the tokens of conflict there.
The battle is ended; the hero goesWorn and scarred to his last repose.He has won the day, he conquered doom,He has sunk unknown to his nameless tomb.For the victor's glory, no voice may plead,Fame has no echo and earth no meed.But the guardian angels are hovering near,They have watched unseen o'er the conflict here,And they bear him now on their wings away,To a realm of peace, to a cloudless day.Ended now is earthly strife,And his brow is crowned with the Crown of Life!
SUPPLICATION
Hearts will sigh. The burdens of distressWeigh on us all. E'en from the natal hourThe purest soul some hidden cares oppress,O'ertasking far our vain and feeble power.Clouds o'er each mountain summit ever lower,And gloom enwraps each hushed and quiet vale:Bright eyes grow dim, each rosy cheek grows pale,For change is earth's inevitable dower.Then the crushed soul, forgetful of its pride,Turns from itself to what it may not seeBut knows exists, for safety and for aid.And well it is that we may lay asideOur burdens thus, and in humilityPray at a shrine where prayer was ne'er denied.
Hearts will sigh. The burdens of distressWeigh on us all. E'en from the natal hourThe purest soul some hidden cares oppress,O'ertasking far our vain and feeble power.Clouds o'er each mountain summit ever lower,And gloom enwraps each hushed and quiet vale:Bright eyes grow dim, each rosy cheek grows pale,For change is earth's inevitable dower.Then the crushed soul, forgetful of its pride,Turns from itself to what it may not seeBut knows exists, for safety and for aid.And well it is that we may lay asideOur burdens thus, and in humilityPray at a shrine where prayer was ne'er denied.
And in that hour of weariness of soul,Not 'mid a marble aisle, 'neath vaulted domes,The stricken heart for aid and refuge comes;But where from lonely hills bright torrents roll,And placid lakes reflect the moon's bright ray,Striving with clouds that ever seem to swayLike ocean waves. When heaven's great scrollIs spread before us does the heart unfoldIts agony to God's all-searching eye,And pray to him to shield it from distress.Then o'er the heart comes hopefulness again,As moonbeams rush from out the clouded sky:The brow grows bright, the spirit dares to blessThe unseen hand that loosed its heavy chain.
And in that hour of weariness of soul,Not 'mid a marble aisle, 'neath vaulted domes,The stricken heart for aid and refuge comes;But where from lonely hills bright torrents roll,And placid lakes reflect the moon's bright ray,Striving with clouds that ever seem to swayLike ocean waves. When heaven's great scrollIs spread before us does the heart unfoldIts agony to God's all-searching eye,And pray to him to shield it from distress.Then o'er the heart comes hopefulness again,As moonbeams rush from out the clouded sky:The brow grows bright, the spirit dares to blessThe unseen hand that loosed its heavy chain.
Night from her gloomy dungeon freed,Had chased the lingering light away,The landscape, clad in widow's weed,Mourned o'er the couch of dying day;Bright-shielded Mars, who leads the hostThat watch around God's burning throne,Placed sentinels on every post,Whose beaming eyes upon me shone!The tears of eve were falling fast,With diamonds spangling every flower,Whose gentle fragrance round was cast,Like incense in some Eastern bower.The wearied hind had left his ploughTo rest within its furrowed bed,And on full many a waving boughWas heard the night-bird's lightest tread.All else was still, save Nature's voice,That whispered 'mid the waving trees,And bade my lonely heart rejoice;While oft the playful evening breeze,Came o'er the moonlit Hudson's tide,And brushed it with its playful wing,As swift it hurried by my side,Perchance in angel's bower to sing.Afar the Highlands reared a wall,To keep the clouds from passing by,There, in a mass were gathered all,Impatient gazing on the sky;Where sister-cloud escaped was free,Sailing the heaven's blue ocean o'er,Like lonely frigate on the sea,That seeks some fair and distant shore.Where Summer's busy hand had woveA shady roof above my head,I sat me down and eager strove,To spy the rebel cloud that fled.I saw it soon, with wondering eye,Take to itself a female form,And hover toward me from on high,As fall the leaves in Autumn storm.Her dress was like the mantle fairWhich Autumn to Columbia brings,And bids the moaning forest wear,With rainbow hues of angel's wings;Her voice was like the witching strainWhich laughing streamlets gayly singWhen Summer o'er the ripening grainSpreads wide her warm and golden wing.The rustling of her snowy wingWas like the music of the breeze,That seraphs mimic when they sing:'T was sweet as when an organ's keysAre touched by angel's hand at night,When all the earth in slumber share,And glimmering grave-yard meteors lightThe church while spirits worship there.Softly she spoke—"Awake! arise!Thy doom is sealed, thou long must roamWhere ocean surges wet the skies,And where the condor makes his home!Thou'lt gaze on many a cloudless sky,Where deathless Summer sweetly smiles,Like restless swallow thou shalt flyWhere ocean's breast is gem'd with isles,"Thy feet shall track the forests wide,Like vast eternity unshorn,Where great Missouri's arrowy tideOn pebbled couch is borne.But when the World's imperial browShall frown like wintry sky,Then seek my cloud-winged bark, and thouShalt soar with me on high!"She paused and vanished—but her formIn Heaven's blue lake I hail,When oft before the raging stormThe clouds in squadron sail;And when the fleet can live no more,But in a mass are thrown,On the horizon's circling shoreShe skims the air alone!
Night from her gloomy dungeon freed,Had chased the lingering light away,The landscape, clad in widow's weed,Mourned o'er the couch of dying day;Bright-shielded Mars, who leads the hostThat watch around God's burning throne,Placed sentinels on every post,Whose beaming eyes upon me shone!
The tears of eve were falling fast,With diamonds spangling every flower,Whose gentle fragrance round was cast,Like incense in some Eastern bower.The wearied hind had left his ploughTo rest within its furrowed bed,And on full many a waving boughWas heard the night-bird's lightest tread.
All else was still, save Nature's voice,That whispered 'mid the waving trees,And bade my lonely heart rejoice;While oft the playful evening breeze,Came o'er the moonlit Hudson's tide,And brushed it with its playful wing,As swift it hurried by my side,Perchance in angel's bower to sing.
Afar the Highlands reared a wall,To keep the clouds from passing by,There, in a mass were gathered all,Impatient gazing on the sky;Where sister-cloud escaped was free,Sailing the heaven's blue ocean o'er,Like lonely frigate on the sea,That seeks some fair and distant shore.
Where Summer's busy hand had woveA shady roof above my head,I sat me down and eager strove,To spy the rebel cloud that fled.I saw it soon, with wondering eye,Take to itself a female form,And hover toward me from on high,As fall the leaves in Autumn storm.
Her dress was like the mantle fairWhich Autumn to Columbia brings,And bids the moaning forest wear,With rainbow hues of angel's wings;Her voice was like the witching strainWhich laughing streamlets gayly singWhen Summer o'er the ripening grainSpreads wide her warm and golden wing.
The rustling of her snowy wingWas like the music of the breeze,That seraphs mimic when they sing:'T was sweet as when an organ's keysAre touched by angel's hand at night,When all the earth in slumber share,And glimmering grave-yard meteors lightThe church while spirits worship there.
Softly she spoke—"Awake! arise!Thy doom is sealed, thou long must roamWhere ocean surges wet the skies,And where the condor makes his home!Thou'lt gaze on many a cloudless sky,Where deathless Summer sweetly smiles,Like restless swallow thou shalt flyWhere ocean's breast is gem'd with isles,
"Thy feet shall track the forests wide,Like vast eternity unshorn,Where great Missouri's arrowy tideOn pebbled couch is borne.But when the World's imperial browShall frown like wintry sky,Then seek my cloud-winged bark, and thouShalt soar with me on high!"
She paused and vanished—but her formIn Heaven's blue lake I hail,When oft before the raging stormThe clouds in squadron sail;And when the fleet can live no more,But in a mass are thrown,On the horizon's circling shoreShe skims the air alone!
Once more the Stanwoods sat of a morning in their pleasant parlor. Once more the sun streamed lazily and warmly through the heavy silk curtains, and once more sat the cherished and beloved invalid in the cosiest nook, with her spectacles beside her, and the book on the little table before her.
Something of change might be felt rather than seen in the blooming faces near her. A thoughtful shadow on the clear brows of youth, the impression of mind and feeling that ever shows itself in the deeps of the eye and about the mouth, where smiles alone no longer play, but the experience of life is showing itself in slight but unmistakeable and uneffaceable lines.
The bell rung, and presently a portly, calm-looking old gentleman came in, and after chatting a few minutes on ordinary topics took his leave. It was a Mr. Gardner of Connecticut; somewhere about the south part, Louisa thought, and Alice thought him a very dull person, and they were both rather relieved when he left them.
"Do you like him, grandmother?" asked Alice.
"No, not exactly: at least he is not a person I should like of myself; but he is connected with much that has interested me, and he is himself a more interesting man than you would think him."
"Now, grandmother, dear," said the young girls, with an earnestness that brought a smile to Mrs. Stanwood's face, "now do give us one of yourrealstories: they are better, after all, than the latest and newest novel, for they are true ones."
"This Mr. Gardner's story is rather an eventful one, certainly; he is a phlegmatic sort of man, as you see, and yet he has not lived without having the depths of his being stirred. I happened to know him and about his affairs a good deal at one time, and afterward I continued my interest in him, though I saw nothing of him for years—but it is rather a long story."
"Never mind the length—no fear of its seeming long, because it will be true, you know."
"Yes, it will be true, but it is liker a fiction than any of the true stories I have told you: but if you are patient with an old woman's stories, and are willing to begin with the beginning, I will try to be as sketchy as possible."
"That will we be," said Alice; "when did you know us otherwise?" and both the girls hurried to take their seats on a low divan before Madam Stanwood's arm-chair, and to look attentively up in her kind face.
"Now then, to begin with the beginning, Mary Dunbar and myself were visiting at a town somewhere in the western part of Massachusetts. I could tell you where, but you may as well have some mystery about it—well, there we were visiting, and enjoying all the hospitalities of a small town where city people were rather rare articles, and prized accordingly. The beauty of Mary, and her gentle winning manners, made a great impression on every body, and a succession of pleasant rides, walks, pic-nics, little sociables, and every thing which could bring young people together, kept us quite delighted with every thing and every body about us; and as attentions and admiration are apt to have a pleasant effect on the disposition as well as the countenance, I, too, came in for a share, and we were quite the belles of the time. Every body regretted, however, and that continually, "thatMr. Gardnerwas not at home—oh! ifhecould see Miss Dunbar! and oh! if Miss Dunbar could see him!" and at last he did come from Burlington, where he had been gone a good while, at last he did see Miss Dunbar, and as in duty bound admired her very much. He was a common-looking young man, as he is now an old one—only then he had a fair youthful complexion and light curling hair, that united strangely with a premature gravity, and methodical way of saying every thing. He was not atakingperson as you say, Louisa, but he was the nabob of the place. His father had died young, and the "Gardner place" was a very small part of the large property which this young man had inherited. He kept house, and managed his large domestic establishment with the greatest propriety and hospitality. All these things are looked into thoroughly in such a town as K——, and young Gardner's character was pronounced unexceptionable, and the match every way most desirable for any girl for twenty miles round.
"Mary did not seem to fancy him much, and when at length her brother came for us, and Mr. Gardner quietly proposed himself to Mr. Dunbar as Mary's suitor, and he had told him the connection would givehimgreat pleasure, they neither of them seemed to think much more was necessary, for absolutely nothing was said to Mary till we got home. Mr. Dunbar lived at Cambridge then, near Boston. He was a widower, and Mary lived with him, and kept his house in some sort, and played with his little boy occasionally. You may suppose she was not a very staid personage, for she was at this time only seventeen years old, and as I was more than twenty-seven, I occasionally checked her wildness, while I could not help laughing at her graceful follies. She should have been born of a French mother and a Spanish father, for she was gay and volatile as the summer insect, and yet she had much depth of feeling, and was full of romantic tenderness, with sometimes a haughty expression that seemed altogetherforeign to her usual character of face, and looked only the index of what might be expected of her if she should ever be exasperated to fight against her destiny. But so far destiny seemed to wait humbly on her pleasure; she was beloved by all, and though left early an orphan, had found in the indulgent tenderness of her brother and his wife a delightful home.
"A little while after our return, Mr. Dunbar took an opportunity when business did not press, for he went daily into Boston and left Mary and me to ourselves through the day, just to mention the little matter of Mr. Gardner's proposal to Mary; and to say he had accepted it so far as he was concerned.
"Now, girls, you must not ask me about characters, I shall tell you the facts, and you must guess at the characters of persons by them, thewhysyou can ascertain as well as I could tell you. When Mr. Dunbar had told Mary, who received the intelligence in silence, he dismissed the topic and no further allusion was made to it.
"I asked Mary soon after if she considered herself engaged to Mr. Gardner.
"'Certainly not.'
"I asked her if she liked him, and she gave me the same laconic answer. So I, too, dismissed the topic. There was a little mystery in Mary's manner about this time. If she did not like Mr. Gardner she did like young Randolph, a Southerner, and a student, who walked with her, and sent her flowers, and notes, and all sorts of pretty and poetical things to read—poems marked for her eye, and the sweetest and newest music for her piano. Then of a moonlight night we had serenades without number, and soft strains sung in a deep, rich voice, so that what with flowers, music, notes and very expressive looking and sighing, the prospect was all but shut out for poor Mr. Gardner, and opening an interminable vista for Randolph.
"Weeks went on—oh, I forgot; in the meantime Mr. Gardner wrote two letters, one to Mr. Dunbar about Mary, and one to Mary herself, but not much about her. It was mostly a business letter, written in a calm, friendly style, and asking her opinion about some alterations he proposed making in the house, adding a wing, I think. He seemed to consider her a person who had a right to be consulted in his arrangements, and I remember he finished his letter with 'Yours, &c.' Mary handed the letter to me with a look of extreme vexation, which at length subsided into a hearty laugh. I laughed too, but Mr. Dunbar did not, and looked rather surprised at us.
"In the course of four weeks from the time of our return, this ardent lover appeared in person. He drove up to the door in a very handsome carriage, and with his servant, all looking very stylish. I saw Mary color extremely, but she sat quite still, and when Mr. Gardner entered and went toward her holding out his hand, she remained in her place, and did not move her hand at all. He shook hands with the rest of us. Mary made tea, and one or two persons coming in, Mr. Gardner became rather animated, and appeared as he was, a very gentlemanly, intelligent person. At last Mary could bear it no longer. She ran out of the room and went up to her chamber. She shared hers with me, and Mr. Gardner's was adjoining ours. It was rather late, between ten and eleven o'clock, and presently Mr. Gardner, who was somewhat fatigued, bade us good-night and ascended to his own apartment. I then went to Mary's room: I found her in a state of great excitement and indignation, and yet though I sympathized fully with her, there was something so comical in the business-like way of doing the thing, which Mr. Gardner had adopted, and his entire unconsciousness of the sort of person he was to deal with, that I began to laugh heartily.
"'Hush! hush! for Heaven's sake! he can hear every word! Oh, my heart!—do you believe, he has come up stairs and gone straight to bed, and is this minute fast asleep! there—hear him! don't laugh! he'll wake as sure as you do!'
"But laugh I did, for I could not help it, albeit Mary's pallid face and earnest eyes checked me in the midst.
"'Now I am going down stairs this minute to put a stop to all this at once. I could not have believed stupidity could have gone so far. I shall see my brother and have an end put to his journeys here: good heavens! to think of it.'
"This I could not object to, of course. Indeed, from the first of this very peculiar 'arrangement' I had not been consulted by either Mary or her brother, and I had a dreamy sort of feeling that by and by we should all wake up and find Mr. Gardner was only an incubus, instead of the unpleasant reality he was getting to be.
"I sat still for nearly or quite half an hour, when Mary returned to her chamber on tiptoe and looking very pale.
"'Now, what is it?' said I earnestly, for I saw it was no joke to poor Mary: her very lips were pallid and trembling, and her hand was pressed to her side as if to still the convulsive springing of her heart.
"'I—I have been talking it over to William,' she said, in a thick, hasty voice; 'I told him I could go no further with this man—this no man—who is willing to take me, without so much as inquiring if I have a heart to bestow—but oh! oh, Susan—Randolph has gone!' she sobbed out in a complete passion of grief, that could not brook further concealment or restraint.
"'But how do you know this?' I asked, after, as you may suppose, I had soothed and hushed her as far as I was able.
"'William told me so himself. I told him I could not, would not marry Mr. Gardner—and he would not believe me—called me a foolish, nonsensical child, who didn't know my own mind—and at last, when nothing else would have any effect on his mind, I said—I said—ah! Susan, how hard it was and is to say it! I loved another!'
"'And how then, my poor child?'
"'Then—he just in his quiet, calm way, that kills one, you know—for it seems the death-blow to all sentiment—he said, 'Mary, if you mean young Randolph, whom I have sometimes met here, playing thelover, all I can say is, he is too discreet to contest the field, witness this note of farewell which was sent to my office this afternoon. He desires his very respectful compliments to you, Mary.' Would you believe it, Susan? I took that note—and read every word of it; yes, and I smiled, too, as I gave it back to him, as if it were the most indifferent thing in the world—though I felt then, as I do now, every line of it chilling my heart like ice.'
"'Dear Mary,' I said, still very quietly, for she grew almost wild with excitement, 'how is this? Why has Randolph gone? have you had any quarrel?'
"'Quarrel! God help you—no!—how should that be? don't I love the very dust he treads on!' she screamed out violently at last, and went into a hysteric fit. The sound of her maniacal voice brought her brother to the door with anxious inquiry, but as I told him Mary was a little over excited, and quiet would soon restore her, at my earnest request he retired. In a short time I was able, with bathing her head in cold water, and constantly soothing her with low murmuring tones of endearment, to see her sobbing herself into a troubled sleep, and as I looked on her beautiful face, pale as marble, and the black hair wetted and matted back from her fine brow, I felt that I saw a double victim to the cruel indifference of others, and the violent emotions of her own untutored nature."
Alice and Louisa Stanwood had gazed steadily into the face of their grandmother, while in the relation of this true story, it lighted up with remembered emotion.
"Poor, poor girl!" said they; "but where, then, was Mr. Gardener all this while? Surely he must have relented."
"Truth compels me to say, my romantic girls, that this quiet-loving lover, to all human appearance, was not in the least disturbed. Indeed, as I listened to the painful breathings of Mary, every now and then catching, as if for life, at a breath, and then hushed into all but dead silence, I was distinctly aware of certain audible demonstrations of profound composure on the part of Mr. Gardner. In sooth, he was not a lover for a romance writer at all; but such as he was—and you must remember our agreement was that I should only relate facts, not account for them—such as he was, he rose with the lark and took his usual walk, to promote his appetite and prolong his life.
"When he returned, as Mary was too unwell to go down stairs, I descended to the breakfast-room where I found Mr. Dunbar uneasily walking the room.
"'How is Mary?' said he, the moment he saw me? 'No better? Tell her to be comforted—be quiet. God forbid I should do any thing to make her unhappy. I will speak to Mr. Gardner about the matter myself, and tell him it can't be.'
"His earnest manner quite convinced me that however he might seem, his sister was really very near his heart, and 'albeit unused to the melting mood,' I felt my eyes fill with tears, as I turned and ran up to Mary's room to comfort her poor heart. She was comforted and quieted, though she declined leaving her room till after Mr. Gardner's departure; and I left her, at her own request, to silent reflection.
"And now you will think all the trouble was over. But did ever faint heart win fair ladie? Never. And Mr. Gardner's heart did not sink when he was told the true story of Mary's indifference and aversion. Both brother and lover had deceived themselves, or rather they had not thought about it. But now that he did think about it, Mr. Gardner was not inclined to relinquish the pursuit. He knew that women were fickle and strange beings, and oft-times refused the very happiness they were dying to possess. Whether Mary were of this species he knew not, but at all events the prize was worth trying for. So he told Mr. Dunbar he would not trouble Mary more at present, but leave it to time. Time did a great many things. Time might make him acceptable to the very heart that now tossed him as a scorned thing away.
"Now Alice, my dear child, don't give up my Mary, nor think her a heartless being, when I tell you that in six months from that time she became Mrs. Gardner. A very lovely bride she was, too—pale as a snow-drop, and graceful as the lake-lily. She smiled, too, with a sort of contented smile, not radiant, not heartfelt, not joyous; there were no deeps of her being stirred as she stood calm and passionless by the altar, and promised to love and honor Mr. Gardner, but a very quiet and pensive sort of pleasure. A part of her soul seemed to have been buried with the past, and to have been forcibly crushed down with all its young ardor and bloom forever; but above it was an everyday being, full of determination to do her duty, to make her husband happy, and be as happy herself as she could. So she was married; and so she stepped into a handsome carriage with Mr. Gardner, and the bridemaids and groomsmen followed in another; and never was there a gayer and merrier cavalcade than at Mary Dunbar's marriage.
"Now, my dear girls, you must skip over a few years, during which I neither saw nor heard of Mary Dunbar. I returned from a journey which I had been taking, and was glad to feel that Mr. Gardner's house lay in my nearest route home. I longed to see Mary in her new character, now that she had had time to feel and perform her duties, and proposed to be with her for a few days, that I might form my own opinion touching this 'mariage de convenance.'
"Mr. Gardner's house was one of some pretension originally; that is to say, it had been built in the style of country gentlemen in New England forty years ago. A row of white-pine pillars surrounded the house from roof to basement, and formed a piazza-walk very convenient in a dull day. Six chimneys crowned the roof, and the whole arrangement was tasteful and imposing. There was a terrace of green turf all round the house, and the offices and out-buildings were at a short distance from the main building. As the stage-coach wound up the avenue,I noticed in the disposition of the grounds and shrubbery the evident hand of female taste. Fantastic arbors, almost hid behind clematis and honeysuckle; little white arches supporting twining roses of twenty sorts, and trees arranged in picturesque groups, gave a character of beautiful wildness to the scenery.
"I fancied Mary the presiding genius of the place as I last had seen her, white and bright, with a little rose-tint on her cheek, caught from nature and the happy quiet of her life—for I had heard that she rejoiced in an infant, whose beauty and promise I knew must renew all the affectionate sympathies of her woman's heart.
"The stage-coach stopped. A servant opened the door, and to my inquiry for Mrs. Gardner, answered hesitatingly, that 'he believed she did not wish to see company.' How much of apprehension was compressed into that brief moment. What could have happened to her? Much might have happened, and I not know it, for I had been living in great seclusion, and had had no correspondence with Mary. However, I gave my card to the man, and bade him take it to Mrs. Gardner, meanwhile sitting with a throbbing heart in the carriage.
"The man returned in a short time with a message requesting me to stop, and to have my trunks taken off. Not a welcoming voice or face met me—and in silence I followed the servant to the parlor. Mary was sitting there; some fire was in the grate, though it was in July; and she hovered over it as if she sought to warm her heart enough to show proper feeling at the sight of an old friend.
"'Mary Dunbar!' I cried out, with my arms outspread, for the figure before me of hopelessness and gloom gave me a feeling almost heart-breaking.
"The sound of her own maiden name acted like magic on Mary. She sprung to my arms like a frightened bird, and clung to me with such intensity of sad earnestness in her face, that it brought back to me all the old sorrow of that night of suffering at her brother's. Once more I soothed her, smoothed back the dark plumage of her hair, and with soft words and gentle caresses, brought her to quietness.
"'You are ill, my poor Mary,' I said, as I looked at her sunken cheek, and the deep gloom about her eyes. 'Where is Mr. Gardner?'
"'Oh, he is gone most of the time,' said she hastily, and then, for the first time, seeming to recollect her duty as hostess, she added, 'but you are tired and travel-soiled, and hungry, too, I dare say; let me make you comfortable.' She laughed a little as she spoke, but not like her old laugh, it was affected, and died in its birth.
"She rang the bell, gave orders for lunch to be brought in, and a room prepared for me, with something of her old activity, and saying cordially, 'Now you must stay with me; now I have got you here, I cannot spare you again.' She relapsed into thoughtfulness and absence. This strange manner puzzled me not a little.
"I went up stairs. The white dreariness of my room chilled me. Mary did not accompany me as she would once have done, to see that all was comfortable for me. The muslin window-curtains hid the view outside, and the stately high-post bedstead, with its gilded tester, looked as if sleep would be afraid to 'come anear' it. My trunks were brought up, and then a silence like death was in the house. No child was in the house, that was clear—and nobody else it would seem. Well, I must wait. I should know all in good time. I dressed and went down to the parlor. Mary still hovered over the fire, looking, in her white wrapper and whiter face, more like a ghost than any living thing. I had intended to be calmly cheerful, to talk to Mary about old times, and by degrees to lead her to speak of so much of her present life as would give me an insight into the mysterious sorrow that reigned like a presence over the dwelling.
"But as poor Ophelia says, 'we know what we are, but not what we shall be.' So no more did I know how to look at that crouching figure and be cheerful and calm. I lost all presence of mind, and could only sit down and cry heartily. Mary rose at the sound of my weeping and came to me.
"'Do you know I cannot weep, Susan? These fountains are drained dry. See, there are no tears in my eyes, though God knows my heart is drowned all day and night. It is dreadful to have such a burning head as mine, and no tears to wet it withal.'
"I wiped my eyes and grew calmer when I saw the wild brightness of her eye; and dreading another nervous attack, I did my best to quiet both her and myself. The day passed on without further reference to any present griefs; she showed me her little conservatory, with a few rare flowers in it, which she had reared with much care, and led me over the pleasantest paths in the grounds and groves attached to the house. In one of these groves, at some distance from the house itself, was a little cleared space, and in the centre of that a small, a very small mound.
"I knew at once what it was. There slept the child I had heard of. So had been broken the dearest tie Mary had felt binding her to life. She stood with me a moment, looking at the mound with a steadfast look, and then putting back her hair from her forehead, as if she tried to remember something, she smiled sadly, and said in a broken voice,
"'You see I cannot shed one tear, even on my child's grave.' I led her gently away among the old trees and quiet paths, and we sat in the warm July shadows till the sun went down.
"You may guess how thankful I was to see at last, as we turned homeward, the tears slowly falling over her face and dropping on her dress, as she walked on, evidently unconscious of the blessed relief. 'Like music on my heart' sunk these tears, for I knew that with them would come the coolness, 'like a welcoming' over her burning pulse, and I carefully abstained from saying a word that would interrupt the feelings rather than thoughts which now agitated her. We returned to the house; tea was served silently, for even the domestics hardly spoke above a whisper; and then we sat in the soft moonlight and looked on the sleeping scene before us. The summer sounds of rural life had long died away, and nothingbut the untiring chirp of the tree-toad was to be heard. The melancholy monotony of the scene hushed Mary's spirit to a quiet she had not for a long time known, and at last she became conscious of having wept freely.
"'I have wept, thank God! that shows I am human. Now ask me all about what you want to know. I think I can talk about it. Mr. Gardner? Oh, he is gone—he is gone a great deal, you know; his business leads him continually away from home, and that leaves me, of course, very dull—very. Shouldn't you think it ought to, Susan dear?'
"Thus incoherently she began; but the first step taken, and secure of sympathy in her hearer, she went on, and you will believe me when I tell you we talked till midnight, and that then Mary sunk, like a weary child, into my arms in a sound sleep.
"I cannot give you her precise words, but the import of her relation I shall never forget. A few words will suffice to tell you what it took her hours of emotion and tears to reveal.
"You remember I told you she looked determined to do her duty, and be as happy a wife as she could. Did ever a wife succeed in being happy with duty for the material? Perhaps if Mr. Gardner had been an ardent lover, somewhat impulsive, and eager to commend himself to her grateful affection, he would have succeeded in doing so; indeed, I am sure of it, in time it must have been so; but, alas! Mr. Gardner was a calm, gentlemanly, sensible, phlegmatic person, who thought his wife's impulsive and hasty nature should be occasionally checked, and who had no toleration for, nor sympathy with, her excitable spirit. Consequently, she soon learned to have a calm exterior when he was at home, which his frequent absences made it easy to assume. They had been married something like three years, and Mary was the delighted mother of a healthy and lovely daughter. Her heart, which had almost closed in the chilly atmosphere of her husband's manners, expanded and flowered luxuriantly in the warmth of maternity. In her happiness she reflected a part of its exuberance on her husband, and smiled with much of her old gayety. 'I felt my young days coming back to me,' she said.
"One day the post brought a letter for her, which she opened, and then left the room to read. The letter was from young Randolph. The writer apologized for his year's silence to her, by an account of a long illness, &c. He knew of her happiness, of her child; in short, he seemed to be informed of every thing about her. He asked to be permitted to correspond with her. The letter expressed the strongest and deepest interest, but couched in such respectful and friendly terms as were difficult to resist. Mary struggled long with her sense of what was due to herself and her husband; but right at last conquered, and she re-entered the room with the letter in her hand. Tremblingly she gave it to her husband, who read a part of it, and then said, with much kindness of manner,
"'Correspond with any of your friends, male or female, my dear. I have not the slightest objection.'
"Mary's good spirit was still at her ear, and she said with some difficulty,
"'Mr. Gardner, the writer of this letter was once much interested in me.'
"'And you in him, eh? Well, my love, those things are all gone by; I can fully trust you. So again, I say, correspond with any body you like, provided you don't ask me to read the letters.'
The generous confidence of her husband deeply affected Mary; but, unhappily, it did not induce her to the safe course of declining the correspondence with this fascinating and dangerous friend. The correspondence went on for years, nay, it was continued up to the time of my visit. And now, my dears, I must stop the current of my story for a minute, to utter my protest against this most dangerous and wretched of all theories—Platonic friendships between a married woman and her male friends.But for the false notions of safety in such a friendship, Mary Dunbar might now be a loved and loving woman. This you will not believe could have been with Mr. Gardner; but remember, Mary was getting to love Mr. Gardner a good deal, and habit and duty and maternal happiness would have done much; so thatin a sort, she would have been both loved and loving. The letters from Randolph, which she showed me, were very interesting, and full of fine sensible remarks on education, all so interspersed with gentle and deep interest for herself, that you saw she was never out of his mind and heart for an instant. Just such letters as a happy married woman would never read, and what any woman's instinct protects her from if she listens to it.
"Things had gone on in this way for two years, or thereabouts, when the child, who had been the subject of so many theories, and in whom were garnered all theconscioushopes of Mary, was taken suddenly ill. Her anxiety induced her immediately to summon medical assistance; and she could hardly believe her physician when he said there were no grounds for apprehension. The child had a sore throat; there was a considerable degree of inflammation about the system, and when he left, he directed Mary to have some leeches applied to the neck of the little girl, at the same time pointing to the spot where he wished them to take the blood.
Mary was particular to place them there, but to her great alarm, the blood issued from the punctures in such a quantity as to drench the bed-linen almost immediately. In vain she tried to stop it—it flowed in torrents, and before the horror-struck servants could summon the physician, the life had ebbed from the child—nothing but a blood-stained form remained. The physician said the jugular vein had been pierced, and that it was something like half an inch nearer the ear than he ever saw it before. I believe he was not to blame—far less was the wretched instrument, whose agony I will not attempt to describe.
"But from that hour the nervous spasms and depression of spirits supervened, which I found had become the habit of her mind. I should have premised that through all the distressing circumstances of the child's death Mr. Gardner was absent. Undoubtedly, could he have been at home, his fortitude and calmness would have been of the greatest service to her; but he did not return until long after her maternal agonies had sunk into a sort of stupor of wretchedness, which looked like a resigned grief outwardly. Far enough was her spirit from the enforced composure of her manner. By degrees she came to look upon herself as born only to make others unhappy. That she had caused the death of her own child was too horrible a thought to dwell on voluntarily, yet it obtruded itself always—and she shuddered at the grave of the being dearest to her heart.
"I remained with Mary until her husband's return, and then left her, promising to visit her again in the course of a few weeks. I was pleased to see the manly kindness of Mr. Gardner's manner to his wife. He evidently did not understand her, but he was gentle and quiet in his words to her, and so far as was in his nature to do, sympathized with her. He was frequently called away from home for weeks together, and had no idea of the effect solitude was having on the mind of his wife.
"As soon as I could so arrange my affairs at home as to leave them, I went to my sick-souled friend. I found her in her chamber and lying on her bed. She looked paler than ever, and her eyes were dry and tearless as when I first saw her before. All over the bed, and pressed in her hands, were letters strewn, half open, and which she had evidently been reading. She looked up at me when I entered, but immediately began gathering up the letters with a strange carefulness, placing them one above the other according to their dates, taking no further notice of me. I saw something agitating had occurred, and seated myself without speaking till she should be more composed. I knew they were Randolph's letters; I had seen them before.
"Presently she spoke in a low voice and seemingly exhausted manner.
"'Susan!' I was by her instantly. She gave me a folded manuscript. 'Between you and me there is no need of words. Take this and read it. It is the last death I shall cause. Leave me now, dear Susan; perhaps I may sleep, who knows'
"She put her hands over her eyes—they were burning as coals—and tried to smile, but the lips refused the mockery. I begged her to lie down and try to sleep, closed the curtains, and left the room, not a little anxious to see the contents of the manuscript which I hoped would explain this new grief.
"The first letter was from a clergyman at the South, containing the intelligence of Randolph's death, after a long illness, and transmitting, at his request, the sealed packet to Mrs. Gardner.
"And saddening enough was the recital of the young man's sorrows. He began with saying that he had scrupulously abstained from ever mentioning his attachment to Mary while he had lived, but he could not refrain from asking her pity for him when he could never more disturb or injure her. He inclosed to her his journal, kept from the first day he saw her, when he loved her with all the fervor of his southern nature, and all the confidence of youth. Then followed the shock of hearing from Mr. Dunbar's own lips of his sister's engagement and approaching marriage. Then the farewell note of wounded affection that assumed indifference. Then a long delirious fever; then the news of Mary's marriage; and then the vain attempt to conquer his ill-fated love. His delight in his correspondence with her; it had been the life of his life, all that soothed the downward passage to the grave. To that grave he had gladly come, feeling that happiness was forever denied him, and only begged her to believe in his never-varying love from the moment he met her to this dying hour, when he signed his name to the last words he should address to mortal.
"All that she had lost—all she might have been, and might have enjoyed in a union with this young man, so brilliant, so amiable, so devoted, rushed on my heart, and contrasting with the reality a few paces off, made me weep bitterly. Oh! had they never loved so kindly!
"I sat long with the manuscript, looking at the writing, some of it years old, and written with a firm, flowing hand, then varying through all the vicissitudes of health and feeling, till it trembled and died away in its last farewell. The peculiar tenderness with which we look on the handwriting of the dead, however personally unknown, affected me. This young man I had seen, though seldom; and I easily connected the memoir before me with the memory of his dark, curling hair, his olive complexion, and the graceful dignity of his manner. I saw his bright eye dim, the dew of suffering on his brow, his cheek pale with anguish of heart and body, and the last flicker of his glorious light going out in darkness.
"From these thoughts I was roused by a sudden and deep groan; it seemed near me, and I sprung to my feet. Bells rang; there was a rush on the staircaise—a shriek—another rush—the opening of doors wildly; all this was in a moment—in the moment I ran out of my room toward Mary's where an undefined and terrible fear taught me to look.
"You will guess what met my appalled gaze. Mr. Gardner, who had returned from a journey while I was reading in my own room, hastened up stairs to see Mary. At the moment he entered, she had completed the act which terminated her life. He received in his arms the lifeless body. The suffering soul still hovered unconsciously. We believe that God who made us, alone can try us, and He who knew all the wo that 'wrought like madness in her brain,' can both pity and forgive."
A deep silence followed Madame Stanwood's relation. Alice and Louise were thinking how little such an experience could have been guessed from Mr. Gardner's exterior.
"I wonder," said Louisa at last, "if he ever knew he cause of Mary's death—did you give him the manuscript, grandmother?"
"Well—whatshouldI have done?"
"Oh! I would have given it to him! I would have rejoiced to see him one hour feeling all the agony which poor Mary had felt so long!"
"That is very natural, my child, for you to say;and, I confess, when I saw him first—his clothes covered with his wife's life-blood, and her marble face on his shoulder; when I sawhiscalmness, his complete self-possession, the directions he gave for the physician, all the time keeping his hand so pressed on the wound, that no more blood should flow; when I saw him hold her till the surgeon closed the wound, and then place his hand on the heart, and watch its beating, if happily life might yet linger there; when I saw this, I longed to say, 'thou cold-hearted being! she is beyond the chill of thine icy love—care not for her! the grave is softer and warmer than thou art!'
"But life had gone out. Not, however, till the loss of blood had so relieved the agonizing pressure on the brain, that reason had evidently returned—for she opened her eyes, with a sweet, sad smile, looked at us all—saw every thing—knew every thing that had passed. She raised her hand to her neck, and then pointed upward, and breathing more and more softly, like the dead child who had gone before her, in its baptism of blood, she slept in peace.
"I thought of all that had passed in the hearts of the two young persons for whom life had so early closed. They had suffered much, but I did not see how any good could occur to the dead or the living by further communication. If Mary had desired it, there had been opportunity enough. She might have left the letters for her husband to read. On the contrary, she had burned them immediately after I had left the room. Her woman had brought her a lamp, and she saw her setting fire to letters—and, in fact, the relics of them were still in the chimney.
"I therefore said no more to Mr. Gardner. He had been much shocked with the events of the day, and for some time was depressed. But he recovered the tone of his mind, and to this day, I suppose, has very little comprehension of what was about him and around him for years—of the broken-heart that was so long breaking."