"Then it has certainly not lived in this country!" replied Sir Patrick, affecting to shiver. "There's a thing they call summer in England, made up of east wind and fog, with a half-extinguished sun, trees trying to put a good face on the matter, a few leaves and flowers born apparently in a consumption, and one or two misguided birds mistaking the imitation for a reality, while chirping their notes all out of tune."
"This oak, Sir, is 500 years old," continued the guide, pertinaciously bent on executing his task; "it contains 300 feet of solid timber."
"And how many leaves are there on it? You never heard! Do you pretend to be a guide, and not know that? The timber will cut up for a tolerable sum, which will suit the next heir."
"Have you the barbarity, even in imagination, to prostrate that kingly tree! look at its gigantic shadow on the grass!" exclaimed Mrs. O'Donoghoe. "I really had, even upon our very short acquaintance, conceived a better opinion of you."
"Then be not rash in altering it! I am all you ever thought me, and more! At the same time I cannot but think, in looking at this immense, overgrown prodigy among trees, how fortunate it is that they stop growing at last, or one such monster might at last overshadow the whole world. Now, it is a hundred years at least since the ground beneath that tree has been enlivened by a single sunbeam! Spare me all the exclamations of delight I see impending! Ladies are taught a taste for the picturesque as part of their full-dress manners, but the truth is, that you care no more for scenery than for a painted sign-post."
"I have no eye to spare for the landscape," said Captain De Crespigny, glancing towards Marion. "Therefore pray let us, like 'Puff in the Critic, omit all about gilding the Eastern hemisphere; or about the setting sun pillowing his chin upon an orient wave.' Nothing gives me so mournful an estimate of people's general happiness, as to join what they call a party of pleasure! Such rising before daylight, such climbing of inaccessible hills, such scrambling on slippery rocks, and such eating of trash, which no one in an ordinary rational state of mind would ever dream of tasting! In short, it begins with the total sacrifice of all comfort, bonnets and dresses in jeopardy, as well as every limb of your body in danger, a great deal of forced vivacity, a number of old, worn-out jests, a seat upon the damp grass, and returning home after sunset in a fog! If these are people's pleasures, what must their miseries be?"
"Certainly the most toilsome of all vocations is that of an idle man," said Marion. "I often think, when observing the extraordinary plans of life on which people set out in search of happiness, that if during one day in every year, we were all obliged to exchange the modes of life we voluntarily adopt, it would produce universal misery. If Mr. Granville were obliged to play sixteen hits at backgammon every forenoon instead of Lord Doncaster; if Patrick had to visit and condole with the sick all morning; if you had to blow the flute five hours a day for Lord Wigton; if he had to hunt eight hours in your place; and if I must lounge all morning in the public room, like Mrs. O'Donoghoe, how wretched each individual would be!"
"Very true," replied Captain De Crespigny. "The various species of men are as different from each other, and as little calculated to associate, as the various species of animals. Sportsmen have a natural antipathy to literary men, politicians to jockeys, and infidels to Christians. Life is to each of these a perfectly different affair. Their feelings, desires, habits, occupations, and pleasures, are entirely opposite, their conversation quite unsuitable, and they all hate each other."
While Sir Patrick, with ceaseless vivacity, teazed the guide by asking a thousand unanswerable questions, the replies to which should have occupied several hours, he amused himself with making premeditated blunders and lively questions, enough to bewilder the brain of their matter-of-fact conductor, who hurried forward with a velocity of body disproportioned to the slowness of his understanding, pointing to an arbor elevated high upon the ridge of a hill, from whence he intimated that the finest view was to be obtained. With a rueful grimace, Sir Patrick prepared to make a forced march in that direction, measuring the height with his eye, and protesting that the fellow certainly had an ill-will at him, for imposing such a task, when he was falling to pieces already with fatigue.
Marion, in the mean time, looked as happy as she felt; having now achieved two very great pleasures, as, in the first place, Captain De Crespigny had been called away by his uncle, and, in the second, he was succeeded by Sir Arthur leaning on the arm of Mr. Granville. The smile of confidence and interest with which Marion now listened and talked, when contrasted with the constrained attention she had bestowed on Captain De Crespigny, was like the difference between the glowing warmth of a summer morning and the icy brightness of winter. While loitering along their beautiful path, picking up here and there a wild flower, or pausing to enjoy the verdant beauties of nature in her holiday garb, cold would have been the heart, and vacant the imagination, not crowded with thoughts and feelings of poetical interest, when, thus surrounded by memorials of many romantic incidents in the national history. To Mr. Granville, all the charms of the place and season seemed familiar. He pointed out to Marion a thousand beauties overlooked by ordinary eyes, while many a refined allusion to his own attachment arose spontaneously out of the subject, and was listened to by her with modest but heartfelt interest. They conversed with glowing delight and perfect communion of thought, on the various interesting subjects which abound in the rich stores of a cultivated mind. Throughout the remarks of Mr. Granville on music, science, and every elevating enjoyment of the human intellect, the poetry of literature, as well as the poetry of nature might be traced. Even the most indifferent subjects were no longer indifferent to Richard and Marion when thus viewed with mutual interest, and when affording a deeper insight into each other's heart and mind; while the gorgeous scenery around inspired them with feelings of enjoyment beyond any that could be attained in gaudy festivity and artificial amusement.
"This place is quite a morsel of Arcadia!" exclaimed Marion, while her eyes were beaming with delight. "I could fancy it some undiscovered country of our own, with not a living being in it but ourselves."
"Excuse me there," said Sir Arthur, smiling. "I shall by no means vote for having my world made so small and select! I am the most sociable of created beings, having fully convinced myself that nothing renders people more utterly selfish than solitude; all your strollings alone in forests and reclining beside rivers, what do they lead to? a prodigious opinion of ourselves, and an extreme indifference or contempt for others!"
"Most undeniably true," replied Mr. Granville. "If we had no happiness to seek but our own, I should not have far to search for mine; yet, as a matter of duty, I am for association and for cultivating the kinder feeling produced by mingling with others. Man could not be happy alone, even in Paradise, and the sternest misanthropes can do nothing worse against society than to become solitary hermits."
"The injury is inflicted on themselves also, as Providence has ordained for wise purposes that, bad as men are, they should love one another," observed Sir Arthur. "My Marion here brings the joys of spring to cheer the winter of my life, and I give her in return the gathered experience of many a long year; while, with you both beside me, the withering leaves of autumn look almost green and almost gay."
"Yet this is certainly the most melancholy of all seasons," replied Mr. Granville. "It has been called the time of fulfilment, when hope is realized,—but it can be an emblem only of Christian hope realized in death. Every hue and every sound reminds me of decay. The howling winds, the fleeting clouds, and the rustling leaves all speak of change and mortality; but permanent hopes and feelings belong only to our religion, which become the charm of existence when they arise, and which neither time nor death can alter. Our earthly affections when founded on such ennobling prospects, entitle us to believe that we shall advance, hand in hand with those we love, along the journey of life, and even at the end, be only separated for a very short period, to be reunited in a world of which even hours so bright as these are but a faint representation. When a Christian dies, he dies into another world. He is then born into a scene more beautiful, more joyous, and more lasting than this."
"How surprising it seems, that so little real admiration is felt for the wonders of nature, though so much is pretended!" observed Marion. "If anything could vulgarize so glorious a scene, it would be that tawdry crowd of many-colored visitors, rending the air with exclamations of delight, which seem chiefly addressed to the crows and jackdaws."
"We should have a band of fairies here, to give suitable music," added Sir Arthur; "and you ought to rob the poets of a few verses to celebrate the shades of Studley. I observe, Marion, that though in actual conversation, a single line of poetry sounds pedantic, yet young ladies in all novels have the whole British poets by heart, and spout entire pages by the yard measure, for every emergency, taken from Cowper, Milton, Byron and Co."
An interesting discussion now ensued, respecting the effect produced on the mind by sacred poetry, which diverged to the subject of sacred music, when Mr. Granville spoke with enthusiasm of the exalting, touching, and saddening influence of Handel's choruses, and of the affecting thoughts they occasionally create. In every remark referring to the heart or imagination, he expressed himself with a depth and fervor, felt and appreciated by the fresh young mind of Marion, who now experienced, under the happiest auspices, how much the mental faculties are enlivened by studying nature. Amidst surrounding peace, the soul exercises its brightest powers of thought, undivided by the shifting scenes of human life, with its thousand fluctuating objects and cares; while the fancy, liberated and unoccupied, is thrown back upon itself, and discovers once more the visions of other days, the stores of memory, experience, and hope.
From the point of view to which their guide now left the party, all the finest characteristics of Fountain Abbey became visible, and Marion found Miss Smythe finishing a masterly sketch of the landscape, which she blushingly yielded up for examination, while Sir Patrick confessed that he had been standing in his most picturesque attitude during five minutes, in hopes of obtaining a place in the foreground. Nothing could be more strikingly beautiful than her spirited representation of the large eastern window, like a light triumphal arch, the patches of ivy clinging round those mouldering walls, and the high, stately tower, nearly transparent with its many windows, all yet in perfect preservation.
"What a fatigue!" exclaimed Sir Patrick, throwing himself in a graceful attitude full-length on the sloping turf. "This day is like the famous Peter Schlemihl, without a shadow!"
"Well done art and nature both!" added Captain De Crespigny; "we have not existed in vain after seeing that matchless view! I shall give bail to live contented and happy during the rest of my life, if you will only endow me with all I see, and let it be shared with the person in this company whom I like best, though perhaps she might tire of me."
Agnes bit her scarlet lip with scorn at words which would once have thrilled to her very heart, but she turned away with an insufferably haughty air on perceiving that herci-devantadmirer had turned his most irresistible looks towards Marion, who was earnestly talking in an undertone to Miss Smythe, while a look of anxious alarm had become depicted on the countenances of both.
"Such moments as these are like the colors of a rainbow, very bright and very fleeting," observed Sir Arthur. "If I had a place magnificent as this, even with the power of choosing my own society, yet, as Dr. Johnson says, 'such possessions make men unwilling to die!'"
"Allow me to differ, then, from Dr. Johnson," replied Mr. Granville. "It is not our possessions, but our affections that could ever make me grieve to forsake this bright green earth. I would rather be loved by one than envied by thousands. I can imagine no happiness that does not spring from the heart, and the most splendid mansion that ever adorned the earth, would be a desert without the smile of those who loved me to welcome my entrance there."
"Who that knows the worth of friendship would not say the same," added Marion, in a deep, low tone. "My wishes never grasp at great possessions, as their very vastness appears disproportioned to our nature and powers. The most superb houses are those most generally deserted by their owners, but I scarcely ever see a retired and peaceful cottage without whispering to myself, 'There I could be happy.'"
"Take my word for it, the whole thing would be odious in a week," said Captain De Crespigny. "I have been a great observer of life from the windows of the New Club, and my serious opinion is, that poetry is all written to mislead our unsuspecting youth into an effervescence of empty enthusiasm about rural felicity on an income of nothing per annum; but I drew the cork out of that bottle long ago, and found it all froth. Once upon a time I was betrayed into living a month at one of those little bird's nests, a gaudy, stuccoed gimcrack, all plaster and green paint, surrounded with roses, hollyhocks, and the flaring trash people call flowers. There were within the walls, three noisy dogs, four ditto children, a roasting-jack and a mangle, all screeching at once! It was distracting! No! no! I hate money myself, but that cured me of ever making a mere bread-and-butter match."
"Yet I could live on the bread without the butter, for any one I really liked, or even the butter without the bread," said Mr. Granville, smiling. "Money is only the raw material of enjoyment, which must be raised into a fabric of solid strength, and embellished with taste, to suit my wishes and hopes. The hook and eye will never be of gold that attaches me, and nothing has ever been so difficult to my comprehension as that any one can possibly form the nearest ties of life upon a mere calculation of profit and loss!"
"Well," exclaimed Sir Patrick, who always assumed an air of bravado before Mr. Granville, to conceal his real feelings, "I am above all the follies of inferior mortals, but I do say, that to me, the most interesting object in nature is a young lady of large, independent fortune, ready to throw herself away on the first man who asks her!"
At this moment, Miss Smythe's sketch-book fell to the ground, while, with a sudden exclamation of affright, she started up, but instantly endeavored to recover herself, and when Sir Patrick had gathered up her pencils, she received them back with blush of double-dyed carnation, as if she could never unblush again, and making an apology for having been startled by the sudden apparition of a hare, she silently resumed her occupation, and Sir Patrick continued to rattle on at his full pitch of nonsense, as if nothing had occurred.
"I wonder Lady Sarah Marchmont did not wait another season for me! I was hastening rapidly to my last shilling, and might possibly have been driven, by stress of weather, to propose, if she had not accepted the Duke of Middlesex, in despair; yet had she possessed a thousand pounds for every shilling, I am not certain that the most golden of her gold could have gilded her.——"
"My dear fellow!" interrupted Captain De Crespigny, in his most sagacious tone, "L'amour fait beaucoup, mais l'argent fait tout; it is easy to say 'fortune,' but where will you ever find one weigh in the scale against Lady Sarah?"
"Easily, any day! As the Spaniards say, 'a man of straw is worth a woman of gold.' Last season, in London, all the heiresses were dying for me."
"Except three who never saw you."
"And at balls, when a chaperon asked any young lady who she would prefer for a partner, the invariable answer was, in the sweetest voice imaginable, 'Sir Patrick Dunbar!'"
"Or the Duke of Tunbridge, and he never dances!"
"Indeed, next season I have serious thoughts of lending; myself out to parties, at so much an hour. It is all nonsense about fortune being blind! The goddess has one eye left, which has been fixed upon me during the last five years, if I would only accept her favors."
"Well, Dunbar! We all know that you are like the elephant in an Irish menagerie, who was the greatest elephant in the world except himself. But be warned in time! They say every man has one opportunity given him of succeeding in life, and if he lose that, he never has a second! Positively, old fellow, now is your time! Do not think me malicious, but even I, your best friend, must allow that you are growing fat."
"Yes!" observed Agnes, in the same rallying tone. "Pat is scarcely such a 'look-and-die' person as he was. I remember him younger, once!"
"Very true! I am getting quite uneasy about you," added Captain De Crespigny, in an admonitory voice. "A young lady's reign lasts from seventeen till twenty, and our best days are over at forty! Dunbar, shall I give you a line of recommendation to Miss Howard?"
"A million of thanks; but as you never succeeded in recommending yourself, De Crespigny, I shall be better, in case of extremity, standing on my own merits."
"Then you will stand as precariously as my old uncle Doncaster, toiling up the bank there, whose legs look so thin, that I often wonder he has courage to venture upon them at all. He is most unfit to come up hill, when actually going down the hill of life so very fast, that he might as well be setting his worldly affairs in order."
"Worldly affairs! He has no other affairs, I suppose," replied Agnes, with a supercilious smile on her haughty lip. "And I think Lord Doncaster will be able to manage his own affairs for many years to come! He intends to live as long as Great Britain is an island. Nobody is old, till he feels old!"
Captain De Crespigny looked at Agnes with a penetrating air of astonishment, which gradually changed to an expression of satirical indifference, while he added, "This is an odd world, Miss Dunbar!"
"So it is! When did that idea first occur to you? It seems so very new!" replied Agnes, in a tone of biting satire. "Patrick has often told me that the De Crespignys are reckoned a sagacious family; and perhaps, after so bright a remark, you may turn out by no means the sort of every-day person people expected."
"Probably not! I shall, perhaps, be like Cimon, awakened from stupidity by the charms of a second Iphigenia," said Captain De Crespigny, with an air as if he had surpassed himself; but the smile with which Agnes listened to this characteristic reply was cold and transient as a gleam of sunshine on a frozen lake; yet while her features remained immoveable as those of a beautiful statue, a strange, unnatural fire sparkled in her splendid eyes, and with a look of withering indignation she turned haughtily away to address Lord Doncaster; while Captain De Crespigny, humming the last opera tune, and switching with his cane the heads off all the flowers along his path, quickened his pace, and resumed his not very welcome assiduities to Marion, who felt insufferably annoyed at being obliged always to hear the same nonsense talked, and to play her part in what she considered a mere hack flirtation on the part of Captain De Crespigny; while she greatly wondered that he had not long since tired of always, in her company, drawing up an empty bucket.
Sir Patrick was preparing to follow, when he observed the young sketcher hastily adding a last touch to her beautiful drawing; and before she could assemble all her scattered implements and materials, which he had assisted her to do, the whole joyous party had nearly vanished out of sight; while the young Baronet's eyes flashed with amazement, on giving a clandestine glance into the sketch-book, to find there an extremely clever caricature of Captain De Crespigny, as he stood a few minutes before, endeavoring to divide his attentions among the whole group of ladies. On examining another leaf, he found, to his yet greater surprise, a beautiful likeness of Clara Granville; and turning instantly to his young companion, with sudden emotion, he entreated permission to have it copied. While he was yet speaking, the young lady, with crimsoned cheeks, though a lurking smile played about her mouth, continued hastily to follow the guide, tracing his footsteps with an accuracy worthy of a Mohican, impatient, evidently, to overtake their companions, as she hastily threaded her way through the forest glades, and beneath the arching branches of many a lofty tree, towards a dark, gloomy-looking plantation, to which their guide seemed now impatiently hurrying them. He was dressed in a smock frock, and had become singularly silent, his replies being all so short and so grudgingly given, that Sir Patrick had angrily yielded up the point, determined to give the man nothing, and not to ask him another question, when suddenly his arm was tremblingly grasped by the young lady beside him; while in a low, strange, unearthly whisper, and with a look of mortal terror, she said, "I do not like this! What can it mean? Has he escaped from confinement? Are you sure that man is our guide?"
"I scarcely looked, but of course he is! It can be no one else!" replied Sir Patrick, in a soothing tone; for he thought she must certainly be deranged. "There he waits for us! We shall overtake our friends immediately."
"Look at this tree!—pretend to be admiring the landscape!" continued the young lady, in a deep, concentrated voice; "but tell me,—can we make our escape unobserved by that man? My life, probably, depends upon your answer!"
Sir Patrick now became confirmed in his opinion respecting the insanity of his young companion, and fixing his eyes on her countenance, he perceived with amazement that every tinge of color had been drained from her cheek—that her lip quivered with fright, and that terror spoke in her eyes, and trembled in every limb; while her words poured out with a rushing vehemence of tone and manner which startled and alarmed him.
"I caught a momentary glance of his countenance! Where could I ever see these eyes and be mistaken? There is madness yet in their expression. He has sworn to destroy me. The whole purpose of his being is revenge!"
"Revenge on you—impossible! Who could be so unmanly—so——"
"You forget that my cousin is insane—that he thinks I drove him into madness—that he pursued me day and night till we shut him up! Can nothing be done?"
"Miss Howard! I might have guessed this! Can it be? When I am here, you need apprehend nothing! He dare not harm you."
"Oh! how little you know him! In his present state, he has the strength of ten men," replied she, with wild and hurried glances. "Once I saw him struggle in their grasp. Why must I forever remember that scene? His cries, his imprecations; but see, he returns! Let us appear still to advance, but concert some plan for my escape, or believe me, my moments are numbered."
The tone of intense agony in which these words were uttered, filled Sir Patrick with pity, while knowing the fearful and mysterious power communicated by madness, even to the feeblest frame, he felt a well-grounded apprehension for the terrified girl's safety, on observing the strong, muscular figure of the maniac; therefore, after walking on some steps, he whispered to her, almost inaudibly:
"The guide seldom looks back. Let me ask him a question, and immediately afterwards drop down the side of this hill, and conceal yourself. I shall continue to follow him, that the sound of your footsteps may not be missed. Whatever the danger is, be firm, and you will certainly escape. Guide!" continued he, elevating his voice in an authoritative tone, yet, even at this crisis, unable to resist a joke; "tell me the exact age of this tree, and how many stones it took to build the Abbey?"
The man threw back some inaudible reply, in a surly, dogged voice, and quickened his pace towards a dark group of fir trees, while again the almost fainting girl gave an agitated glance at Sir Patrick, who silently pointed towards the turf edging along the gravel-walk, making her a sign to take flight upon it as noiselessly as possible, while he proceeded forward himself with no fairy tread, making the sound of his footsteps as loud as if there had still been two behind.
After the terrified girl had hastily slid down a steep bank and disappeared amidst a mass of evergreens, Sir Patrick was beginning to contemplate the expediency of adopting a similar plan, seeing that in conflict with a madman he could gain neither honor or advantage, and might be seriously injured, when the maniac suddenly burst into a thrilling, fearful laugh, and, snatching a pistol from his breast, turned fiercely round, when Sir Patrick instantly recognised, as he had begun to expect, the countenance of that excited stranger, whom Captain De Crespigny had in the morning named to him as Ernest Anstruther.
Astonishment and unimaginable fury glittered in the madman's wild and haggard countenance, when he missed the object of his pursuit, and he looked for the moment like a wild beast at bay, till, springing upon Sir Patrick with a cry of hideous rage, he seized hold of his arm with a delirious grasp, and clenched his fist, shouting in accents of frenzied rage, while the white foam was on his lips:
"Where! where is she? Tell me, or you shall die! Have I tracked her through earth and air, through sky and ocean, to be disappointed now? With sleepless care have I dodged her steps! Demons drove me on! Fiends and serpents have beset me! Coals of fire are on my brain! Cold hands are on my heart! All is horror! Every human soul shall shudder for the deeds I do! A brand of shame shall be on my head! The dogs shall howl when I pass! Even now, the sun never shines on me! Show me, then, where she is, or I will tear you limb from limb."
Sir Patrick stood firm as a rock before this whirlwind of passion, though filled with horrible amazement, as he beheld the burning glare of the madman's eye, and heard the sharp, shrill, shrieking voice in which he spoke; but if he appeared terrible in his fierce excitement, he seemed more terrible still, when a moment afterwards, with a cold, livid look, as if turned into stone, he added:
"She shall be mine, or she shall never be given to another. I would not spare her for ten thousand lives. If she refuse me, her lips shall be closed forever and ever. I shall destroy and be destroyed. My love or my vengeance must be gratified; and mark my words. You are the friend of Louis De Crespigny. I would it had been himself, and one of us should never have left this spot alive. There is a dark and dreary account to be settled between him and me. My first warning shall be my last," added he, in a hollow whisper, while a look of dangerous meaning gleamed in his eye. "He deserves death at my hands. He wrenched my sister from her home, trampled on her affections, and is born in all things to injure and supplant me! He must die!" added the maniac, with a strange glare in his eye-balls. "It is, perhaps, for his sake that I am rejected! Wild voices are whispering in my ear! Unnameable horrors beset me! Fierce phantoms are hissing and shouting behind me!"
The unfortunate being uttered these words with preternatural fury, while his countenance wore an expression of deadly malignity. He then paused, ground his teeth, and with the frightful levity of a maniac, uttering a howling, fiendish laugh, and rushing away, disappeared into the thickest part of the forest, leaving Sir Patrick horror-struck at the awful spectacle of a shattered intellect, the fragments of which were of so deadly a nature; while, at the same time, amidst a torrent of other thoughts and feelings, chiefly directed to secure the safety of Captain De Crespigny, he could not but smile at his present discovery, that the plainly dressed, shy, reserved, but rather satirical young lady, whom he had been of late patronising and bringing forward, was no other than the superbly endowed heiress, Miss Howard Smytheson, respecting whom he had so often rallied himself.
Sir Patrick gave instant information to the civil authorities at Harrowgate, respecting the dangerous madman now in the neighborhood; and when every particular of his adventure had reached Agnes, she felt an undefined sensation of disappointment that the end had not been of a more exciting nature. Never happy unless her mind were in a complete foam of excitement, she lived for sensation, and would have bought it at any price, being heard often to complain, that now nothing ever happened. Every day she considered as a chapter in her own life, into which she wished as many incidents crowded as possible, caring little whether joy or sorrow prevailed among those around, if the weary vacuum in her thoughts were but filled up. A few elopements or murders made a newspaper extremely acceptable; while even public riots she would have allowed to a certain pitch, provided she could pull the check-string as soon as they became at all inconvenient or alarming to herself; while she often remarked, in a querulous tone, that a revolution had been a thing threatened and talked of all her life, without ever seeming any nearer. The world, in short, if arranged to suit her taste, would have been one shifting scene of accidents and offences, fires, overturns, explosions, narrow escapes, marriages, births, deaths, mournful catastrophes, and astonishing vicissitudes.
On the evening after the pic-nic at Studley, Sir Arthur having gone early to bed, at his lodgings near the Granby, Marion accompanied her sister and Mrs. O'Donoghoe, to fulfil a dinner engagement at the Crown Hotel; and on their way home, the lively widow rallied Agnes on her prospect of walking at the next coronation, saying, that Lord Doncaster had evidently laid down twenty years of his life, lately; and that she had once seen the Doncaster diamonds, then considered the finest family jewels in Britain, which Queen Charlotte herself was supposed to have coveted, and the box containing which required two footmen to carry it.
"The tiara would shine like glow-worms in your dark hair, and the bandeau round your waist would be exquisite! I have heard it remarked, that people in this perverse world will not be happy; that those who have every wish gratified, and not a want upon earth, invent a grievance for themselves, and live upon it; but I wonder where the Marchioness of Doncaster could find one. You might drive away care in that beautiful pony carriage, kill time with your grand pianoforte, and read your own happiness in the envy of every one around. Even your sister seems scarcely so happy at your good fortune as might have been expected!"
"There is no earthly blessing I do not with my whole heart desire for Agnes," replied Marion warmly, when thus appealed to. "But if she has any plans such as you speak of, let no one ask me what I think, as it is quite enough that she should herself know my utter abhorrence of them."
Tears of indignant sorrow sprang into Marion's eyes, and she gazed earnestly out of the window, trying to conceal and to conquer her emotion, while Mrs. O'Donoghoe exclaimed, in a tone of satirical burlesque,
"For of the choice, what heart can doubt,Of tents with love, or thrones without!"
"For of the choice, what heart can doubt,Of tents with love, or thrones without!"
"For of the choice, what heart can doubt,
Of tents with love, or thrones without!"
As their carriage drove on, the night being clear and moon-lit, the wind sweeping over the earth with a rushing sound, and ten thousand stars twinkling in the blue vault above, Agnes remarked, in accents of surprise, that crowds of people were running eagerly on the road, with animated looks, and an appearance of most unusual excitement. Soon after she heard a rumbling noise behind, as of some heavy vehicle hurtling and thundering along the road; and the next moment a fire-engine passed at full speed, amidst the cheers and vociferations of a dense multitude, who assisted and followed its progress, with looks of mingled curiosity, delight, and apprehension.
Marion hastily thrust her head far out of the carriage, and perceived that a lurid glare burned on the sky, evidently reflected from High Harrowgate, while bright spiral flames shot upwards into the flaming arch above, and burning flakes of fire descended in showers of terrifying brilliancy. Every now and then a fresh burst of dazzling light blazed to the very heavens, while Marion watched the flickering flames with intense and solemn interest; but Agnes, after the first surprise was over, sank lazily back into the carriage, saying, with a look of peevish disappointment,
"It is only a fire somewhere! Fires are so common now, that they excite scarcely any sensation! One might fancy, Marion, that you had a valuable uninsured house at High Harrowgate!"
"It looks, even at this distance, very awful!" replied Marion. "The hills are like molten fire, while the broad red reflection on those massy clouds makes the very heavens seem on fire! What gleams of fiery light! What sheets of flame! It is fearfully grand! We should pray, Agnes, that no lives may be lost!"
"Fires are never fatal now! Years ago, they were said to be sometimes really frightful; but now any one I ever saw might be extinguished with a tea-cup. I never so much as read the accounts in one of the newspapers. We shall of course be asked to subscribe for the sufferers," added Agnes, in a tone of contemptuous pity, "poor creatures!"
"What a strange look of terrified enjoyment is depicted on the countenances of all who hurry past," exclaimed Marion. "It is curious, that probably some of those people who are ready to risk their lives in extinguishing the flames, would yet feel quite disappointed and ill-treated on arriving, to find that there was actually no conflagration. There are no limits to the love of excitement. When people have made up their great minds to a catastrophe, they feel really cheated if it does not occur; and I often think, that old people especially wish their few remaining days to be crowded with events, like the last pages in a novel."
The noise and the mob had greatly increased: loud shouts, hoarse yells, and clamorous cries of fire resounded on every side, with the heavy trampling of a hundred feet, when suddenly Sir Arthur's coachman whipped the horses violently, and proceeded forward with unprecedented rapidity, till Marion fancied the horses must have taken fright at the ignited sparks, which were now borne along in the air, and that maddened with terror, they were actually running off.
Agnes, now really in a state of excitement, thrust her head again out of the window, believing that the coachman must be drunk, and that a catastrophe, though not exactly what she would have selected, might actually occur, and Marion continued anxiously gazing around, till gradually a horrid sensation of doubt and fear gathered upon her mind, as she looked in the direction from which the light came. The curtain of night was withdrawn—the surrounding scene seemed one mighty furnace—and the roaring noise of the flames was now distinctly audible. At a turn of the road the whole became distinctly visible; and Marion, suddenly uttering a wild cry of horror and amazement, covered her face with her hands, and sank back, almost fainting, in the carriage; for she had at once become aware that the fire must be among the houses where Sir Arthur lodged. The garden around them was one vivid blaze of burning light—the stems of the trees were visible in dark relief, on a drapery of fire—while a brilliant pillar of flame, like a gigantic serpent, twirled its enormous coils upwards into the very sky. Forked flames appeared bursting from every window, and sweeping over the whole house, which was one great reservoir of fire, while a black volume of smoke rolled far away to the distant horizon.
"Is there no mistake?" exclaimed Marion, wringing her hands with terror, and bending her head almost to her knees in unendurable grief. "Is there no hope? Tell John to drive on faster—faster! O let me out—let me fly to the house! This is dreadful! fearful! Shall we never reach the spot! Listen to their cries! Let me out! let me out!"
"Dear Marion! there are crowds giving assistance! He must have escaped," said Agnes, in trembling accents. "I feel certain he has escaped. He has surely heard the noise, and called for help!"
A dense mass of persons round the crashing house, wild with agitation, and vehement in their attitudes and gestures, prevented the carriage from advancing farther; but Marion instantly opened the door, sprang out, and with an impetuosity which nothing could resist, rushed onwards. She was not one whose faculties could be prostrated by terror or danger; for it was then that her quick judgment and generous spirit became most active; and while crowds were standing around, in vacant, helpless wonder, she reached the spot where a tottering ladder had been placed against the walls, and where the engines were playing upon the blazing roofs, while flames spouted forth in every direction, and a confused din of cries and vociferous oaths became audible on every side.
Timid and easily frightened on slight occasion, all emotion now appeared to be dead within the breast of Marion, who paused, while, with bloodless cheek, and a face as rigid as death, she seemed turned into stone; yet every word whispered around fell with frightful distinctness on her ear.
"The last house that caught fire is uninhabited, I believe?" asked a stranger, calmly. "I am informed that the whole conflagration was raised by a madman—a perfect Guy Fawkes, who afterwards escaped. There are crowds of servants belonging to the heiress Miss Howard, and he had some scheme of carrying her off; but most mercifully she and her attendants were all saved."
"Very fortunate indeed, as the stair-case is now falling in," added another, while crash followed crash in frightful succession. "Some one talked of a blind gentleman being there, but that is probably a picturesque addition, to give the story interest, for that tall house seems really empty."
At this moment, a low murmur of grief and horror arose among the crowd, followed by a death-like silence. In a part of the building high above what had yet been consumed by the flames, though already undermined, the shutters of a window were slowly opened, the sash hastily thrown open, and the venerable figure of Sir Arthur appeared there, his grey hair streaming in the wind, and his head stretched forward in the act of listening. He raised his hand to his forehead, as if bewildered, and seemed evidently calling for help; but his feeble voice was lost amid the war of elements, the crackling and blazing of all around, and the loud crash of falling timber.
No one had a hope of his being rescued, and the most selfishly indifferent looked on with breathless dismay, while Agnes threw herself on the grass in an agony of horror and despair; but Marion rapidly grasped her hand with convulsive energy, saying, in a low deep whisper, "I shall save him, or die with him."
Using the speed of thought she flew forward, while every voice was raised in loud shouts to stop her; and several persons, as soon as they became aware of Marion's rash intentions, followed vehemently in pursuit, determined to force her back; but eluding their grasp, she wrapped her large cloak around her, and ascended the crackling beams of the staircase, beneath a shower of glowing sparks, while blazing flames were running round the cornices and ceiling, with a sound like incessant thunder.
The smoke nearly blinded her—the smell of burning wood became suffocating—and the heat was nearly unbearable. Long wreaths of fire and smoke soon shut Marion out from the view of those who followed, and none could pursue with their eyes the fearful progress of her enterprise, while she hurried onwards, having one only thought in her heart, that Sir Arthur, blind and alone, was calling for help, and might yet perhaps be saved. A wooden gallery, leading from the stair to Sir Arthur's room, though fringed with an intense and devouring flame, which had almost entirely burned it away, showed yet a plank remaining close to the wall, charred and blackened, while shrivelling and crackling in the devouring element. Over this Marion quickly but cautiously glided; and opening the Admiral's door, she tried to compose her voice, saying in a clear, distinct tone—
"I am here, uncle Arthur! come away quickly! give me your hand!"
"What is the matter, Marion? What is all this?" replied he, turning round with a quivering lip, and in a tone of piercing agitation. "The blessings of your blind and helpless uncle be upon you! I am so agitated and confused! Where is the fire? Every body had forgotten me but you!"
"Uncle Arthur!" answered Marion, hurrying with him towards the door, where they were almost suffocated by a dense cloud of dust and smoke; "you were always brave and determined. All our courage is necessary now. Be firm and we may escape. You are now at the door. This wooden gallery is nearly burned away. It could not sustain us both, and no earthly power shall persuade me to go first. You can only impede me by speaking of it. Lose not a moment, then, for that will but increase our danger. Cling close to the wall; feel it all the way. I shall call out when you are safely over. Then remember the fifty steps we always counted to the first landing-place. After that, turn to the right, and you are safe. May the Almighty protect and guide you!"
"But Marion! my dear child! you are coming this way too?"
"Yes! or perhaps some other!" said she, assuming a tone of indifference, while she despondingly gazed at the rapidly consuming beam, and the thick smoke, which arose like mist before her sight.
"Go on, dear uncle, and pray for yourself and me."
Marion led Sir Arthur to the very brink of the yawning gulf, and cautiously placed him on the tottering gallery, deaf to his entreaties that she would seek her own safely first, and imploring him not to render her enterprise unavailing by delay. Flames were leaping upwards in the dark abyss beneath, dust and mortar fell in clouds on every side, while the heat and noise of the flashing light became more and more terrific; but still she spoke calmly to him, in tones of confidence and encouragement, giving directions while he remained in sight, and anxiously watching, as he slowly and cautiously groped his way. All Sir Arthur's firmness of look and voice had now returned, as he questioned or thanked her, when suddenly a deafening crash took place over head, an impending fragment of the roof was precipitated with a roaring convulsion upon the spot where a moment before the Admiral had stood, and nothing now remained beneath the eye of Marion but a hideous gulf of smoke and ruins, one bewildering medley of crackling beams and falling floors, a mighty mass of horror, which it made her giddy to behold.
Marion ceased now to speak, fearful that her voice might induce Sir Arthur, if yet alive, to return; and nearly hopeless of his having escaped, she now felt that no duty was so imperative, as, if possible, to seek her own safely. Yet what resource remained? Her heart beat hurriedly, stopped and beat again, while a choking sensation arose in her throat, when for the first time she fully contemplated her own instant danger. The noise was like that of a mighty wind, while the flames swept the very heavens, with a sound more appalling than the loudest thunder, and she hurried almost breathlessly back to Sir Arthur's apartment, which had not yet been attacked by the devouring element.
The heat was even there so intense, that she hastened to a window for air, and a shuddering groan burst from the surrounding multitude when they beheld her; but no succor was near, while the door became instantly blockaded by shivered beams and smouldering ruins, which had fallen at the entrance, setting it on fire, and she saw around long aisles of flame, and deep caverns filled with surges of fire and smoke.
Marion felt now that death impended in its most terrifying form. It was no new thing with her to prepare for the certain approach of dissolution; yet often as she had tried to realize the idea of that mighty change, never did it appear before with the appalling distinctness, which now filled her spirit with unutterable awe, while standing as it were between earth and heaven, all beneath full of boundless terror, but all above promising peace, and full of hope.
No effort of her own could avail. Marion looked at the long line of tall houses on her left, untouched by the flames. She glanced at the crowd below, all anxiously gazing upwards, in death-like stillness, and at the garden, which seemed paved with faces; but while the consuming flames pursued their desolating track, not a hope of rescue appeared. A storm of burning ashes fell on every side, and all around was a whirlwind of fire and smoke.
Marion's figure became conspicuously seen at the window, every pane of which was already so heated by the blazing conflagration behind, that she leaned against the shutters, and gazed towards heaven, as if already lost to all connection with the world around.
"Martyrs have willingly died in a scene like this," thought she. "Let me also testify the faith in which I die."
Marion clasped her hands, while now her spirit rose superior to danger, and, seeing the hundreds gazing at her in silent, horror-struck sympathy, she calmly pointed upwards, that all might remember the comfort derived from a hope full of immortality.
The heat had become so intense, that Marion, choked almost to suffocation, leaned farther than ever out of the window, trying to catch one breath of air, when to her astonishment she now perceived the figure of a man descending from the window of a house far to the left, and having planted his foot on a narrow ledge of stone, which ran along all the buildings as an architectural ornament, he pressed his hands firmly against the wall, to preserve his balance, and, with a degree of skill and intrepidity scarcely to be credited, rapidly traversed that shelf towards the place where she stood, carrying one end of a rope in his hand, the other extremity of which had been already fixed to the window from which he came out.
"Marion! dear Marion!" cried the voice of Richard Granville, which even at this awful moment thrilled to her heart with deep emotion, "we must live or die together. Trust yourself to me! Here is a firm footing. Try it! At the worst you cannot be in greater danger than now."
While yet speaking, he had securely fixed the rope to the window-frame, thus forming a temporary balustrade, and after carefully assisting her out, he slowly led Marion with one hand on the rope, and her face to the wall, safely towards a house as yet untouched by the fire.
A low, whispering murmur of intense interest arose among the spectators, when they saw hopes of her being preserved, but not a voice was raised till they perceived her safe, when a deafening cheer burst from the spectators, which rang through every ear like a trumpet. Again and again it resounded, louder and louder still, but Marion heard it not, for no sooner was she out of danger, than, with a cry of thankfulness, she rushed into the expanded arms of Sir Arthur, and fainted.
When Marion recovered to consciousness, her first evidence of returning life, was the deep blush with which she extended her hand to Mr. Granville. Tears now streamed from the blinded eyes of Sir Arthur, while he spoke to her with every term of affectionate endearment, saying, in a voice that yet quivered with emotion—
"My child! my dear Marion! I thank God that your life, young and full of hope, has not been sacrificed to keep my grey hairs a few hours longer from the grave. Would that I were able to thank you as you deserve."
"Never thank me for anything, dear uncle Arthur. I owe you more than my existence, for I owe you, under Providence, all the happy days I have ever known in it, and long, long, may I be able to show you my grateful affection."
"My very dear girl, aged as I am, and shattered now by this night's alarms, I have little more hold of life than of the gale that blows along the ocean, but existence would yet be precious to me, if I could only live to see my Marion as happy as she merits."
"Already I am!" replied Marion, affectionately embracing her uncle, while a torrent of joyous, agitated tears rushed into her eyes. "I am too happy, dear uncle Arthur! You are saved, we are restored to all we love, and my life is doubly precious to me, preserved by the generous courage of—of——"
"Of one whose first earthly wish is to render it happy," said Mr. Granville, warmly. "I trust that for many long years we shall testify together our gratitude to God for the mercies of this night."
A smile and a tear struggled hard for the mastery in Marion's downcast countenance, while Richard continued to speak with confidence and hope of the happy future, trusting that their engagement, though unavoidably postponed, could not be long delayed, and that if Clara recovered in a more favorable climate, to which she must set out the next evening, he might speedily return, to resume his duties and occupations, with new motives of hope, while Sir Arthur expressed, in brief and powerful language, his fervent wish that nothing might interfere with a prospect which secured the happiness of his beloved Marion.
"Yet," observed Sir Arthur, next morning, when Mr. Granville called to take leave, "I dislike long engagements, and never would recommend one. If you both remain constant, it is unnecessary, and if either of you change, it would be little worth to obtain from a sense of honor what should only spring from affection."
"There is nothing to fear on that score," replied Mr. Granville, exchanging a smile with Marion. "We are most apt in general to doubt where we have most at stake, but I have lately become almost presumptuously confident. I would not wish, Sir Arthur, that Marion should feel engaged one hour after she ceased to love me more than she could love any other, or if there were any man on earth who could value her more, and make her happier. One thing I ask of you, dear Marion, and only one," added he, his eyes flashing with animation—"That till we meet again, nothing shall make you doubt my unalterable affection; and in asking this, I ask only what I intend in return towards you, that our mutual confidence may be for ever unbroken, from the first hour we met."
"To trust you once is to trust you for ever," answered she, in a low, scarcely audible voice. "All my happiness in life depends on one, who, I am certain, never will change."
"Then, as surely as day follows night, I hope our present parting shall be followed by a happy re-union; and months will seem like hours, till I return to claim you as my own, till I once more hear your voice, and till this hand is again clasped in mine."
Marion listened with a quivering smile on her lip, while a tear trembled in her eye. For a moment, the blood forsook her cheek, and returned again in rushing torrents over her whole countenance, while the eloquence of the heart was in her eyes, though she attempted not to reply; and Mr. Granville continued, in accents of the deepest tenderness,—
"It grieves me more and more every day to think of leaving you, but my duty to Clara must not be postponed any longer. Her strength is gradually diminishing, and though she does not idly or selfishly indulge her feelings, yet here, above all places, she seems least likely to forget a sorrow, which is, I trust, not incurable. We, who are Christians, know that there is some good purpose in her affliction, and that the lightest straw which casts its balance into our lot, is ordained by the infinite power, and the infinite goodness of One who cannot err."
"Yes," replied Marion. "In going through life, I feel myself reading a book by the best of all authors. Many of the incidents, as we advance, surprise and disappoint us; but, knowing that the whole is on a plan which could not be improved, we feel certain that all shall turn out right and best in the end."
"It is a conviction such as you describe, Marion, which allays the torturing and almost feverish anxiety I should otherwise suffer respecting those around whom my warmest affections are kindled," observed Mr. Granville. "Religion is indeed the best of all anodynes for pain of every kind; otherwise, who can tell how greatly I should have suffered in our sorrowful uncertainty respecting Clara's recovery, and in leaving you, my Marion, to whom I am now bound by every tie that can unite heart to heart. I will not,—I cannot say, farewell; but let us live in hope of better days to come."
Mr. Granville at length took leave; and, as he hurried for the last time across the common, Marion leaned against the window, and followed him with her eyes till he vanished out of sight; while Sir Arthur's countenance shewed that his kind heart was full of anxiety and sorrow; for he had seen many vicissitudes in human life and human attachment, therefore he trembled for the possibility of sorrow hereafter, to one whom he loved with all the unbounded warmth of his nature.
Marion closed her eyes that night with the pleasing conviction, that the world contained not a happier being than herself. She felt conscious how much Mr. Granville had elevated her mind by his conversation, what a treasure of interesting thoughts and pleasing hopes he had left her; and, while following him in imagination through every mile of his journey, and sadly counting the many days that must intervene till they could meet again, she resolutely turned her mind towards all the pursuits and occupations calculated to render her worthy of Richard Granville, when he returned to claim her as the partner and companion of his future existence.