"To suckle fools and chronicle small beer;"
"To suckle fools and chronicle small beer;"
but which nevertheless, when thus accomplished, may be accounted one of the most honourable a woman can fulfil, the one perhaps best meriting that commendation which the faithful workers in this world's vineyard shall receive at the last day. "Well done, thou good and faithful servant," &c., and though some might have fancied, at the time that Alice Seaham, with her refined tastes, and somewhat superior qualifications, was entering on a vocation she was ill fitted to sustain, either with pleasure or profit to herself or others, it surprised them to find how little these characteristics stood in the way of her usefulness, capability, or perfect contentment in the part she was called upon to act on this life's theatre—that part which devolves on the wife of a professional man, with an increasing family, and limited income. How far more usefully and happily employed for herself and others were those refined tastes, and those superior qualifications, though thus adapted, like the beautiful plants and products of the foreign climes, to the common uses and necessities of mankind, than if suffered to expand and expend themselves upon the leafless desert, in selfish, listless, idle inefficiency, often preying morbidly on their own resources for lack of legitimate exercise or healthful outlet—those very tastes and qualifications, proving oftener a curse and a reproach, than a blessing and an ornament to their possessor. For woman's strength and honour lie in her heart, in her affections, in the duties which from them devolve; if she lean upon her own understanding, trusts to the resources of her mind, or intellect, she leans on a broken reed, she makes for herself broken cisterns which can hold no water.
Selina Seaham, the third daughter, and the beauty of the family, only one year before the marriage celebrated on the day in question, consulted the inclinations of her own heart, rather than the prudent wishes of her friends, and gave her hand to an officer, who had immediately after left England to join his regiment in India with his bride; and then the two younger sisters had remained together at Glan Pennant without any seeming prospect of such speedy disseverment as had since occurred, till some months after, Sir Hugh Morgan, the great man of those parts, to the astonishment of all, proposed to the youngest Miss Seaham and was accepted; he being her senior by some five-and-twenty years. And though he had ever been on very intimate and friendly terms with the family, had not shown any tendency that way since the time, when, on the Seahams first coming to settle in the neighbourhood, after their father's death—Mr. Seaham having absented himself from Glan Pennant for some years, for the education of his daughters—Sir Hugh Morgan made an offer of his hand to the eldest daughter, and finding himself at fault, she being engaged at the very time to Lord Everingham, oddly overlooked the precedence of the genius and the beauty amongst the sisters, and transferred his offer of a place in his hard-named pedigree to the startled Mary, then a girl of scarcely seventeen. But though a man of much honest worth, not to speak of the worldly recommendations of the match, the proposal produced no effect upon the mind of the unambitious maiden, but surprise and repugnance.
"And she refused him, though her aunt did say,'Twas an advantage she had thrown away.(He an advantage!) That she'd live to rue it."
"And she refused him, though her aunt did say,'Twas an advantage she had thrown away.(He an advantage!) That she'd live to rue it."
Whether or not, she had reason for repentance on this score, may cause, amongst those who follow her future history a difference of opinion. But certain it is, that with not a pang of envious regret on her own account, had she seen her young and blooming sister, Agnes, give her hand that morning, five years after the event of her refusal to the same excellent man, the only disagreeable feeling the occasion excited in her mind being, the difficulty of reconciling herself to the idea, that her dear, pretty, young sister Aggy, should so cheerfully acquiesce in a fate which had once raised in her own mind such unqualified disinclination.
But then she was the only individual in the world, who did not think the fair bride the luckiest creature in the world, and the wisest.
"Who but a fool like me, they think, no doubt," mused Mary Seaham, with a humble sigh, "would have rejected such an advantage as they seem to consider it. True, I was only seventeen at the time, but am I wiser at twenty-one? to-night's experience has well shown forth." And she remembered a certain fable which had composed a portion of her childhood's lessons, 'The dog and the shadow,' and smiled in very scorn and derision at her own puerility.
But alas! there are shadows which our wild and wilful imaginations have conjured up which, scorn and deride them as we may, are destined to cast a darkening influence on our future destinies.
"Our fatal shadows that walk by us still;"
"Our fatal shadows that walk by us still;"
to become, in fact, a substance—a reality—from which we would often fain be able to awake and say: it was a dream.
"Grant us not the ill we ask—in very love refuse—That which we know, our weakness would abuse."
"Grant us not the ill we ask—in very love refuse—That which we know, our weakness would abuse."
But it is as well, perhaps, to retrograde, in order to relate the incident which some years ago had cast its beguiling shadows upon the pure stream of our heroine's young existence. She was scarcely sixteen, when, under thechaperonageof her sister, Lady Everingham, then a bride, she had found herself at the summer fête, given by the father of her cousin, Mr. de Burgh's beautiful betrothed. Lady Everingham was taken ill soon after her arrival, and returned home with her husband, leaving her young sister under the nominal care of her cousin, Louis de Burgh, and hisfiancée(the queen of that day's revels), who had, with the most eager kindness, taken upon themselves the charge, but as may be naturally supposed were but far too much better employed to carry out their good intentions, so that Mary, having for some little time kept near them, feeling very greatlyde trop, being at length divided for an instant from their side, saw the lovers, when next in view, disappear together within the shade of abosquet, and she left alone amidst these few strangers, and indifferent friends, who happened to be near the spot.
Her youth and timidity made this situation of itself one of sufficient embarrassment to her feelings, there being none with whom she felt such a degree of intimacy or acquaintance as gave her courage to claim their protection or companionship, but when these even began to drop off by degrees from the parterre, wherein a portion of the company had assembled, and the last lady had eventually departed without her having the courage to follow in her train, poor Mary's distress was at its climax. Only a group, composed of several gentlemen, with not one of whom she was in any way acquainted, remained behind.
The solitary position in which she found herself, causing her to become a conspicuous object, the timid, though not awkward embarrassment of the young girl as she stood irresolute, whether to remain or to retire, attracted the attention of the party. They all looked at her, one or two exchanged smiles which poor Mary, was very quick to interpret into those of amusement and derision; and crimsoning to the temples, she was preparing to glide away in desperate search of her cousin, when out of that very group from whose fancied satire she was so anxious to escape, a gentleman stepped forward and politely addressed her.
He was afraid that she had lost her friends; could he in any way assist her? She thanked him, and hesitatingly murmured the names of her cousin and his bride elect. But this seemed sufficient explanation to the gentleman, with regard to the situation to which he found the young lady exposed. He smiled good-naturedly—feared she must not find fault with any deficiency intheir chaperonagejust now; and begged her to accept his arm, and avail herself of his escort until she could be restored to the runaways. The speaker was young and handsome. Mary Seaham looked up gratefully into the dark eyes bent down so kindly upon her. The tone in which he mentioned her cousin seemed to denote that an intimacy existed between them. But setting aside these considerations, there was no prudery in that young and innocent heart. She placed her arm within that of the stranger's with thenaïveand simple confidence of a child, and suffered him to lead her away from the scene of her discomfiture.
Neither did he seem in any hurry to relieve himself of the charge he had undertaken, for though he met and spoke to many lady friends, to whose care he might, had he desired it, have committed Mary, he did not avail himself of the opportunity but still continued to conduct her here and there—finding she was a stranger to the beautiful domain—to every spot considered worthy of interest and admiration, seeming himself pleased, and interested by the gentle intelligent delight, with which his young companion—now that she was happy and at ease—entered into the spirit of everything around her; her first shyness wearing away, and her innocent re-assurance, being still more effectually established after an encounter with her cousin and his intended. The enamoured pair, reminded, for the first time of the charge they had neglected, by the sight of Mary, if they looked a little surprised at first, to see her thus accompanied, were evidently relieved by finding her in any way happily disposed of; and when playfully attacked by her protector for having so unfaithfully fulfilled their office to his fair charge, they answered in the same tone that Miss Seaham could not have found a betterchaperonthan her present companion. And then the handsome lovers, a more graceful pair at that time could not have been found, gaily kissed their hands, and pursued their flowery path—a path in which there surely seemed as yet to lurk no thorn.
"It was the time of roses,They plucked them as they passed."
"It was the time of roses,They plucked them as they passed."
Thus again, left standing alone together, Mary's companion looked at her and smiled. Mary too smiled, but she blushed also and said: "You see they will not take me off your hands; pray do not let me be in your way, but take me to some lady of your acquaintance, who will doubtless let me stay by her side."
"Not for the world!" was the earnest rejoinder, "at least if you are not tired of my society. Dinner—to which you must allow me the pleasure of conducting you—must," he added, looking at his watch, "soon be ready; till then, let me show you the aviary."
And again he offered his arm, and led her in that direction. After which, as she owned at last to feeling a little tired, they seated themselves in the pavilion, where others of the company were assembled, awaiting the banquet to be given in the house. There was one peculiarity about her companion which impressed Mary at the time.
Though animated and lively in his manner and discourse when he did speak, his words were not many, whilst on the contrary the earnest, thoughtful interest with which he seemed to listen to every sentence proceeding from her mouth, trivial and simple as she considered them herself to be, at the same time as it encouraged and irresistibly flattered her modest pride, made her, nevertheless, wonder, and once or twice look up inquiringly into the dark eyes bent down so earnestly upon her face, as she gave utterance to any opinion or remark, as if to discover from what reason this might proceed.
She could not tell what attraction there often is in the simple-minded, guileless nature of a youthful being like herself, to the man plunged in the cares and passions of maturer years, and though Eugene Trevor, at that time was young—not more than five and twenty—a more experienced eye than Mary's might have discerned,thatstamped upon his countenance, which told him to be, even then, no stranger to those dark storms of passion, or of secret sin which, sweeping over man's breast, blight before its time the freshness, health, and purity of youth.
But how could Mary Seaham read all this? how should her guileless spirit divine the wild, dark thoughts—the sinful purposes, unspeakable, unspoken, which must even at that very time, like so many demons, have been working, suggesting, forming themselves within the soul of him who thus was seated by her unsuspecting side? And well for all of us, that thus it must ever be—
"For what if Heaven for once its searching lightLent to some partial eye, disclosing allThe rude bad thoughts that in our bosoms' nightWander at large, nor heed Love's gentle thrall;Who would not shun the dreary uncouth place,As if, fond leaning where her infant slept,A mother's arm a serpent should embrace;So might we friendless live—and die unblest."
"For what if Heaven for once its searching lightLent to some partial eye, disclosing allThe rude bad thoughts that in our bosoms' nightWander at large, nor heed Love's gentle thrall;Who would not shun the dreary uncouth place,As if, fond leaning where her infant slept,A mother's arm a serpent should embrace;So might we friendless live—and die unblest."
Yet Mary need not have wondered, even had it been given her, to look in less partial light upon the being who by his kindness and other fascinating qualities had so propitiated her sensitive, susceptible young heart.
Must the little brooklet wonder if the heated traveller, passing fiercely on his dusty way beneath the noon-day summer sun, consumed with inward fever and parching thirst; should turn with grateful delight to kneel and bow his head over its cool and limpid waters, blessing unawares the source of such pure refreshment.
But then, alas! he rises like a giant refreshed to pursue his course of ambition, pleasure, sin to whichever of these that course may tend; and what more does he think of that clear, pure stream, when quaffing freely of those turbid waters, from which at length the fevered votary is fain to slake his fiery thirst?
And thou silly stream, to retain so long the softened shadow of that dark image, which for one brief minute had been reflected on thy limpid bosom!
It was then five years since the period of the little episode we have retrograded to relate, five years which had softly glided over Mary Seaham's head, in the almost uninterrupted retirement of her mountain home, and the simple enjoyments and pursuits this existence provided. Five years, which at her happy hopeful period of life, adds, oftener than detracts, from each charm either of mind or person—when, under such untried circumstances, the heart springs forward upon the wings of hope with freshness yet undiminished, and vigour unabated.
It was then between five and six years after, that Mary Seaham, on a summer eve found herself approaching her cousin's house in ——, which place she had last visited with her sister, Lady Everingham, and from thence repaired to that fête which had proved no unimportant incident in her life.
Then came the yearning of the exile's breast,The haunting sound of voices far away,And household steps.HEMANS.
Then came the yearning of the exile's breast,The haunting sound of voices far away,And household steps.
HEMANS.
Silverton was a fine estate, and though the country in which it was situated was tame and unlovely in comparison with that to which she had been for so long accustomed, yet Mary Seaham was not so inveterate a mountaineer that she could look, as I know many do, upon the different aspect of the mother country, with the eye of utter aversion and distaste, and though she could not perhaps have gone so far as to agree with old Evelyn when he, asserts Salisbury plain to be in his opinion, the part of Great Britain most worthy of admiration, yet for the gaze to be able to stretch unbounded over a level tract of cultivated land after having been long imprisoned within the massive confines of a mountainous district, she was not ashamed to own, there may be a certain degree of pleasurable relief.
But as may be supposed, any very critical survey of surrounding objects was at an end, when with that degree of nervousness ever more or less attending an arrival of this kind, she drew near the place of her destination in the carriage which had been sent to meet her. There was no one to receive her at the door when she alighted, but the servants, and its being near the dinner-hour, Mary concluded her cousins to have retired to their dressing-rooms. On making inquiries, however, to that effect she was informed that Mrs. de Burgh had not yet returned from her drive, and Mr. de Burgh was also from home.
Mary therefore accepted the offer of the civil domestic to be shown to the room prepared for her, and retired thither, not sorry to be able to rest awhile, after the fatigues of her long journey before a meeting with her relatives. Perhaps her spirits might be a little damped by the reception, or rathernon-reception she had met with.
There is so much importance attached to a warm welcome, by those not well initiated in the careless frigidities of general society, that the very sensitive and inexperienced are often more chilled by any such accidental or habitual infringements on this score, than the occasion really requires.
We grow wiser or harder as we pass farther through the world, and learn to look upon it no longer as one large home of loving hearts, such as some may have accounted it; but a stage on which every man is too intent to play his own individual part, to have much respect for these minor charities of social life—the word, the look of kindness, of affection which to the sensitive and unworldly spirit are often of higher price—contribute more to make up the sum of mortal happiness, than the most generous deed, or striking act of beneficence. We grow as we have before said, wiser or more callous, as we pass on through this world of our's—learn to see upon what principle society is founded, and cease to shrink chilled, and wounded, before each touch which falls coldly upon the warm surface of our tooexigenteheart—each unsympathetic glance which meets our wistful gaze.
Mary Seaham sat down by her window, which commanded a view of the carriage road, through the park, to watch for the return of her cousin's wife.
The evening was lovely, and she could not feel astonished that Mrs. de Burgh should have prolonged her drive. A cool freshness had succeeded the sultriness of the day, and she had perhaps not gone out till late.
The scene too on which Mary looked was pleasant and refreshing to the eye. The wide park with its troop of spotted deer, herding for the night beneath the luxuriant foliage of the trees, which in rich clumps or single majesty were scattered thickly over the demesne, gilded by the still bright but softened sunbeams.
But Mary Seaham was not quite able to enter into the enjoyment, which at any other time would have been amply afforded her.
She raised her eyes and began to feel a regretful longing for the sun-gilt or cloud capped mountains, which for so long had met her gaze, towering above the highest tree-tops of the Glan Pennant gardens—and then a sense of strangeness and desolation came creeping over her feelings.
For the first time she seemed to realize the true nature of her present position—and the sight of some labourers, wending their way across the by-paths from their daily toil, tended to bring her gathering sadness to a crisis.
"They are going home," she murmured, and a few tears stole gently down her cheeks. Then she thought of her sisters—the youngest, in particular, as most lately and intimately associated with her in sympathy and companionship, now so far divided, not only by distance, but by the different ties and interests of her new estate; and then occurred to her the words she had so lately heard.
"Do you think you will find your cousin's house agreeable to you?" and she began to ask herself that question too, though not for the same reason, which had suggested the question to Mr. Temple—not lest it might prove too gay and worldly for her tastes and inclination, but by reason of the loneliness she might therein experience—that worst of loneliness—the loneliness of the heart, or,—
"She might meet with kindness and be lonely still,For gratitude is not companionship."
"She might meet with kindness and be lonely still,For gratitude is not companionship."
Why then had she come here, would not her sister Alice, have gladly opened her doors to receive her? And all the comparative inconvenience and discomfort of that arrangement, seemed to melt into insignificance before the other attractions of the picture suddenly conjured up. A sister's warm, and earnest welcome—the familiar family voice which would have greeted her, the tone of which at once would have made her feel at home, though in a strange land, amongst unfamiliar scenes and personages, whilst even the noisy delight of half-a-dozen nephews, and nieces, which would have celebrated her arrival, came before her fancy—as she sat in her silent solitary grandeur—in most alluring contrast with her present undemonstrative, though luxurious reception.
But no! she had been attracted by the urgent and pressing desire expressed in the letters of her cousins, to make their house her home until the return of her brother to England, and there had been something in the impression she had received, or the associations connected with her memories of those relatives, that had moved her, perhaps with little reflection, to embrace the offer.
But now she is thinking on the fête of six years ago—of the urgent alacrity with which her cousin and his beautiful intended had then volunteered their protection and support, and their subsequent neglect and abandonment. Might not this incident be a type of what she had to expect, under her present circumstances?
She did not even, in this mood of dark imagining to which she had yielded herself, carry her thoughts beyond the point of her discomfiture on that occasion, or she might perhaps have had some dream analogous to the sequel, conjured up to brighten the gloom of her present anticipations.
But dreams of any nature came not just then to her relief. She had never felt so wide awake to dull reality, unrelieved but by the meek philosophy with which she determined to make the best of everything relating to her present position, cheerfully and contentedly to submit herself to existing circumstances, keeping ever in view for her comfort the expected return of her much-loved brother from Canada, when whatever turn their fortunes might have taken, "for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer," so that brother wrote, the cherished picture of their early youth, might still be realized, and a home provided for his favourite sister, which at least would make her independent of the cold and heartless people of the world, till she found or desired a dearer or a better.
"Two things are left me for my destiny:A world to rove o'er, and a home with thee."
"Two things are left me for my destiny:A world to rove o'er, and a home with thee."
Mary Seaham had just arrived at this point of her meditations, when her maid returned to say that Mr. de Burgh was in the house dressing for dinner, and to inquire whether her young lady would not do the same. Mrs. de Burgh had not come home, but it was already past the usual dinner hour.
Miss Seaham proceeded accordingly to make the simple toilette she thought suited to the occasion, for she learnt from her maid that there was no company staying in the house, and then she determined to go down stairs, to have at least her interview over with her cousin Louis, whilst awaiting the arrival of her tardy hostess.
Alas! when angry words beginTheir entrance on the lip to win;When sullen eye and flushing cheekSay more than bitterest tone could speak,And look and word, than fire or steel,Give wounds more deep—time cannot heal;And anger digs, with tauntings vain,A gulf it may not pass again.L. E. L.
Alas! when angry words beginTheir entrance on the lip to win;When sullen eye and flushing cheekSay more than bitterest tone could speak,And look and word, than fire or steel,Give wounds more deep—time cannot heal;And anger digs, with tauntings vain,A gulf it may not pass again.
L. E. L.
Two little children—a fine girl of four and a delicate boy of three—were passing from the drawing-room, through the vestibule on their way to bed followed by a nurse. Mary Seaham would have stopped to make the acquaintance of her little cousins, but too eager in their amusement, the noisy chase of one another through the longsuiteof rooms, they, like Jaques's careless herd, "jump along by her and never stay to greet her," in spite of the chiding injunctions of their attendant, to wait and speak to the young lady. And Mary walked on into the adjoining saloon.
There she found Mr. de Burgh standing alone, his elbow resting on the marble mantelpiece of the fireless grate, his eyes gazing fixedly through the opposite window.
He did not hear her noiseless approach over the velvet carpet; and she had time at the same moment that she recognized the unchanged, almost feminine beauty, of her cousin's handsome features, to remark no very promising expression, namely, one of dissatisfaction and annoyance, to be now seated on his countenance. It, however, brightened instantaneously, when he became aware of Mary's presence; and with the most affectionate cordiality, he advanced to meet and welcome her to his house. Then seating her on an ottoman by his side, he made anxious inquiries as to her journey and the wedding of her sister, slightly touching upon other family matters, in which, as guardian and trustee to his young cousins, he was concerned. And thus, for awhile, his attention and thoughts seemed diverted from any previous cause of discontent. But his powers of interest or politeness seemed at length exhausted. He became evidently restless and fidgetty, cast sundry impatient, or as Mary was more likely to interpret them, anxious glances towards the window which commanded the same view across the park as she had been lately contemplating, and finally rising from his seat, resumed his former station near the chimney-piece, to watch, as Mary concluded, for the arrival of his truant lady.
Mr. de Burgh had only alluded to his wife's absence during their conversation, by casually mentioning her not having returned from her drive; but Mary Seaham, after noticing with rising sympathy and compassion, the increasing perturbation of her cousin's countenance, and naturally attributing its origin to the tender solicitation of an adoring husband, ventured, after a few minute's silence, in which Mr. de Burgh had been too much absorbed in his own feelings for common discourse, to express in her gentle voice, the hope, that he was not uneasy at her cousin Olivia's remaining out so late.
"Uneasy? Oh no!" Mr. de Burgh exclaimed, aroused by the question, and turning to the speaker with a careless laugh, "Oh, no, not in the least uneasy! I suppose I shall have the pleasure of seeing her back between this and bed-time. Oh no! My present cause of uneasiness is merely at the thought that the dinner—for which about an hour ago I had considerable appetite—must be, by this time, fit only for the dogs to eat: and, also, that you"—he added, softening his voice of irony into one of kind concern, observing probably, that his cousin looked pale, grave, and exhausted, "that you, after your long journey, must be quite faint for want of nourishment; but it is just like her," he continued, in soliloquy, hastily walking to the window, "selfish, inconsiderate, careless of everybody, everything, but her own pleasure and amusement. But at all events," he added, "we'll have dinner, such as it is," and approaching the bell, he rang it impatiently, and desired that the dinner should be immediately served.
If Mary Seaham had looked pale and serious before, she was ten times more so after what she had heard. This outbreak of her cousin took her so by surprise. The bitter words he had spoken with regard to his wife, were in such direct unconformity, not only with anything she had been accustomed to hear from one relative towards another, but, also, with the picture her imagination had previously formed of the mutual happiness and affection of the married pair with whom she had come to sojourn. She looked back to the devoted lovers in their wanderings through the flowery paths of courtship, devotion she had believed to be but a faint fore-shadowing of the full-crowned sacred bliss, the well-tried love, of a six years' union, such as she had expected it would be now her lot to witness. But those disdainful expressions, this disparaging declamation, came like an icy wreath upon her warm imaginings.
"Selfish!" "Inconsiderate!" Could her cousin's beautiful wife really merit such a character? Or was the accusation merely the casual effusion of a hungry husband's fretful humour. If this were not the case, it spoke indeed little for her own chance of comfort as that lady's guest. Still she was far less affected by any selfish interested consideration, than by the shock her inherent principles and preconceived ideas upon the subject had received.
Louis de Burgh remained too much engaged with his own inward dissatisfaction, for any further conversation; consequently, no more words were spoken till dinner was announced, and then her cousin's arm, with something of revived cheerfulness, was offered to her, and they proceeded to the dining-room.
They were seatedtête-à-têteat the table, and had not proceeded half way through the meal, which was far from justifying Mr. de Burgh's unpromising prognostications, when the sound of carriage wheels was heard, and a loud peal at the door bell denoted the expected arrival.
Mr. de Burgh made no demonstration of interest or excitement, but continued the occupation in which he was now pleasantly engaged in uninterrupted indifference. Mary, on the contrary, felt no slight degree of nervous trepidation, and laying down her knife and fork, awaited in anxious suspense the entrance of her other cousin.
In less than an instant, Mrs. de Burgh, in carriage costume, made her appearance followed by a gentleman.
"Well, here we are at last," she exclaimed, rushing in with careless abruptness, "and Mary arrived, I declare!" she added, with immediate change of tone, "well, Iamshocked! I really had imagined that you could not be here till nightfall. But welcome a thousand times!" she continued, advancing with extended hands, and embracing her with an affectionate warmth which almost brought tears into Mary's eyes.
"The fact is," she continued after a few other inquiries, and having thrown her bonnet aside, and put back the ringlets from her face—flushed and heated to a very brilliant hue by the exertions of a hurried drive—she seated herself to partake of the dinner reproduced for herself and her companion. "The fact is, I have really been engaged in your service, for feeling sure you would be horrified to come out of the wilds of Wales, to find us here in as stupid and uncivilized a state of reclusiveness as any of the natives of Kamschatka—though, for what I know," she parenthesized with a laugh, "theymay have much more society of their kind—feeling sure, however, of the dullness of this place, I determined to drive my ponies as far as Morland, and see if I could beat up a few recruits from the party assembled there, for your enlivenment."
Mary smiled and blushed, hardly knowing how to answer this speech.
"Iam a person," continued Mrs. de Burgh, "whocanexert myself a little for the sake of my friends—whoamwilling to take some slight trouble, unconnected with my own tastes and inclinations; to consider that a young ladymaypossibly require a little more amusement than seeing trees cut down—a little more society than a man, his wife and two children."
Mary remarked the flashing eyes of Mrs. de Burgh directed towards her husband, as she made this latter speech with much of marked significance in her look and tone; and with the very contradictory charges brought against the absent wife by Mr. de Burgh fresh in her memory, she would, if she had deemed it smiling matter, have been inclined to smile to see the table thus turned upon him.
Perhaps her cousin was not himself quite unimpressed or unconvicted in his conscience by the unconscious retort, for colouring slightly, and for the first time directly addressing his wife since her entrance, though he had entered into some conversation with the gentleman by his side, he said with a not ill-natured, though somewhat provoking laugh, which nevertheless displayed to great advantage his set of ivory teeth.
"Well, Olivia, pray, the next time let yourunselfish consideration," with a stress on the latter words, "be a little more considerately timed. To keep a tired guest waiting for her dinner till nearly nine o'clock—for you knew as well as I did, that she was sure to arrive before seven—whilst you are scouring the country in search of people to say pretty things to her on the morrow, is a specimen of attentive consideration, which at least was not dreamt of before in my philosophy."
"No of course not," was the contemptuous reply, "though perhaps Mary Seaham may see the circumstance in a different light, supposing that dinner, as she is a reasonable being, is not quite so important and paramount a point in her existence as in yours. But why you waited for me I cannot tell. You are not usually so painfully polite. I suppose you wanted to show off to the utmost, the great inconsideration which marks my conduct towards yourself and others, and the excessive consideration of your own."
How distressing and astounding all this was to Mary's feelings may be imagined, more especially from being herself made so prominent an object in the debate.
In the first agitation of the meeting, what with the grateful and gratified surprise which the unexpected warmth of her reception had inspired, and subsequently her attention and interest being so much absorbed by her newly arrived cousin, on whose unchanged beauty she could not refrain from dwelling in unfeigned admiration—her opposite neighbour who sat with his back to the now declining light had almost entirely escaped her notice; but now, as with downcast eyes and flushing cheeks, she sat listening in painful embarrassment to this conjugaltirade, it occurred to her to lift a timid glance to discern how her fellow-sufferer bore the infliction to which they were mutually exposed. She raised her eyes, therefore, and having done so, that very timid glance was rivetted, and became gradually changed into a gaze of earnest, calm surprise, for as she gazed the indistinctness of the vision seemed to clear away, and the face of him whose kindness had been once so strongly impressed upon her girlish fancy to be revealed to her astonished sight.
The same dark eyes fixed with interest upon her changeful countenance, that very same peculiar smile which he had turned towards her, when they were left standing alone together on the occasion of her secondcavalierabandonment, by the self-absorbed lovers—seemed to mark his observation of the discomfiture which the startling contrast now exhibited had caused her. A smile—such as moves one to look again, and observe with curious interest the countenance from whence it emanates—in much the same way as one would look upon a book of strange characters, whose mystic language we feel certain could we but read it aright, would unto us a tale unfold of more than common import.
But, setting aside the interest which this unexpected recognition inspired—the encouragement that smile, as on the former occasion just mentioned, tended to convey—Mary Seaham felt—considering the many secret thoughts and feelings which in her idle moments she had once wasted on this—the almost, it might be said, ideal hero of her imagination—wonderfully little affected by the fact of his real substantial embodiment—not more so perhaps, than one might be who awakens from a series of fanciful dreams to see the object who has played therein the most fantastic and highly coloured part, standing, divested of all supernatural and exaggerated characteristics, before his eyes; and with a smile, almost as quiet and confiding as the one with which she had yielded herself to his guidance six years before in the grounds of Morland, she had acknowledged the recognition, ere Mrs. de Burgh, after an angry pause and a killing glance across the table—provoked by her husband's mortifying contradiction of her assertion respecting the knowledge she had entertained of the hour of her guest's arrival (a glance which was probably intended to convey to his conviction how extremely odious an individual she deemed him)—recovered sufficiently to proceed with her relation in the same lively strain.
"I was not very successful," she continued. "Of course, every body is in London; however, I have the promise of a reinforcement in a day or two. In the meantime, determined not to return empty-handed, I pressed this gentleman—whom I found just about to start homewards—into my service, and brought him—I cannot say a willing captive—chained to my triumphant car. Nay, I am glad you are beginning to be ashamed of your conduct," she added, as the accused party, looking at Mary, attempted a smiling refutation of the charge.
"Ah, yes, we will imagine what you would bring forth as your excuse—that you did not expectsucha young lady, for you know I told you therewasa young lady in the case, that you cannot deny. Well, Mary and I will forgive you, now you are here, if you will only stay, and withal—make yourself extremely agreeable—but, bye the bye, I ought to introduce you to one another—how very forgetful of me! Miss Mary Seaham or rather Miss Seaham now, I believe I should say—Eugene Trevor."
And Mary Seaham and Eugene Trevor exchanged another smile, as they slightly bent their heads in acknowledgement of the ceremony, but both at the same time murmuring their declaration of a previous acquaintance.
"Indeed!" exclaimed Mrs. de Burgh, with some surprise, "when and where could you have possibly met?"
"You forget the fête at Morland, when you so cruelly abandoned Miss Seaham to her fate, whilst you and Louis," with a little covered malice in his tone, "went love-making."
"Ah! to be sure, I do remember something of the kind," rejoined Mrs. de Burgh, "that is to say, of you two being together, but that is so very long ago," she added, in a tone of marked carelessness, and glancing at her husband.
"Not quite six years," said Mary.
"Onlysix years!" interposed Mr. de Burgh, blandly, "I should have imagined it sixteen."
"And I too," rejoined the wife colouring; "but at any rate," she continued, with affected carelessness, "it has been quite long enough to have almost effaced from my mind the impression—almost the recollection of things then existing—you two it seems," glancing from Mary to Mr. Trevor, "have better memories."
Mr. de Burgh retorted with a beautiful smile; that the tablets of their memories had happily been kept apart during that interregnum, that there was nothing like six years of close contact for rubbing out old impressions.
"And then in that space of time," he added, probably with more secret meaning than the not very original remark expressed, "and then in six years, a great deal of change may have taken place."
"A great deal indeed!" was almost unconsciously echoed by Mary's lips, as her thoughts silently wandered over the domestic changes and family events which coloured her reminiscences of that intervening period, whilst from the soft pensive expression which stole over her countenance, it might have seemed that it was more a soothing relief to take refuge from "the strife of tongues" in the private sanctuary of thought thus suggested, than that any very sharp pang of sadness or regret was roused by this reflection.
"A great deal certainly!" had echoed instinctively from Eugene Trevor's lips. But why has the smile with which he lightly commenced the words, faded away like a gleam of sunshine, from the dark hill side, ere they died upon his lips, what were the suggested thoughts, the awakened recollections he would have wished diverted? What record did the history of these six years inscribe on the tablets of his memory?
What ever it might be, he did not pause to contemplate it long; but pouring himself out a glass of wine, drank it down hastily, as if the ruddy draught could wash away the unrepented sin; the unatoned iniquity of his secret soul—then looked and spoke as unconsciously as before.
"Each mind has indeed," as it has been ably written, "an interior apartment into which none but itself and the divinity can enter. In this secluded place, the passions fluctuate and mingle in unknown agitation. Here all the fantastic, and all the tragic shapes of imagination have a haunt—where they can neither be invaded or discerned. Here projects, convictions, vows, are confusedly scattered, and the records of past life are laid; and here in solitary state, sits conscience surrounded by her own thunders which sometimes sleep, and sometimes roar, while the world knows it not."
We said or quoted something to the same effect in a preceding chapter, and added—that it was well that it should be so.
There are some moments in our fateThat stamp the colour of our days.* * * * *And mine was sealed in the slight gazeWhich fixed my eye, and fired my brain,And bowed my head beneath the chain.L. E. L.
There are some moments in our fateThat stamp the colour of our days.* * * * *And mine was sealed in the slight gazeWhich fixed my eye, and fired my brain,And bowed my head beneath the chain.
L. E. L.
Mrs. de Burgh soon after led Mary to the drawing-room, when all that was kind and affectionate, and calculated to reassure her young guest's mind, with regard to her previously conceived misgivings, was expressed by the former lady.
They were, however—owing probably to the lateness of the hour, soon joined by the gentlemen.
Mr. de Burgh immediately sat down by his cousin's side, and, as if with the intention of making himself more thoroughly agreeable than circumstances had previously permitted, he entered into animated discourse, in which, finding Mary perfectly able to sustain a competent and intelligent part, he had speedily passed from the merits and beauty of his children, and such like natural easy points of discussion, to some improvements in the grounds, in which his interest seemed to be at present much engrossed, showing more scientific and general information on the whole than she had previously conceived him to possess;—he, appearing on his part pleased to find so willing and intelligent a listener in his young lady cousin.
Mrs. de Burgh in the meantime had, soon after the conversation commenced between them, called Eugene Trevor away to the open window, and conversed with him at intervals in a low, confidential voice, whilst turning over a pile of new music lying on the ottoman by her side.
At last she called out to Mary, and asked her if she sung.
Mary replied in the negative, but remembering well the beautiful voice possessed by Mrs. de Burgh before her marriage, she rose with glad alacrity to solicit a song from her.
Mrs. de Burgh, whose question probably had been but a note of preparation for her own projected performance, smiled compliance with the request, and proceeded to the piano, whilst Mary, ensconcing herself in a quiet nook between the piano and window, yielded her senses to the soothing enjoyment which poetry and melody conjoined always afforded them; and Mrs. de Burgh sung that evening only English songs, with a beauty and pathos perfectly enchanting.
"My spirit like a charmed bark doth swimUpon the liquid waves of thy sweet singing,Far away into the regions dim of rapture,As a boat with swift sail wingingIts way adown some many-winding river."
"My spirit like a charmed bark doth swimUpon the liquid waves of thy sweet singing,Far away into the regions dim of rapture,As a boat with swift sail wingingIts way adown some many-winding river."
Many an evening Mary sat in that same place, and listened with never-tiring pleasure to the same delightful songs, but never perhaps with such pure, unmingled pleasure as had this sweet music on the present occasion inspired her.
"Softest grave of a thousand fears,Where their mother care, like a drowsy child,Is laid asleep in flowers."
"Softest grave of a thousand fears,Where their mother care, like a drowsy child,Is laid asleep in flowers."
Once, at the close of a peculiarly beautiful ballad, she lifted up her eyes, those "down-falling eyes, full of dreams and slumber," now gemmed with a delicious tear, to encounter the dark orbs of Eugene Trevor, as he stood shaded from the light, in the deep embrasure of the window.
"You are very fond of music," he said, coming forward with a smile, on finding his earnest gaze thus discovered.
"Oh, very fond indeed!" Mary replied, with a low sigh, which marked perhaps the spell of musical enchantment to have been broken by the question, or it may be—the moment when some other power first fell upon her spirit.