a kiss which might have been heard in the next room, and left the mark
of his metal sleeve-buttons on my throat. My mother saw my confusion,
and, as she did not approve such familiar and boisterous ways, coolly
said, "My daughter is not used to such rough salutations, my dear
Seymour; and I did not expect such a remnant of the great romping boy
from you."
Alas! all remnant of youthful unrestraint and of the boy now vanished;
natural feeling, which the sight of his early companion and playfellow
had called forth, disappeared, and the manners of the young men of the
world _then_ and _for ever_ replaced them. But what provoked me was,
though he seemed to consider himself as a _man_, he never even for a
moment treated me as a _woman_. I was his "little Helen," and his
"chicken," and his "tiny pet;" and then, dreadful degradation! he used
to chuck me under the chin: nay, once he asked me, pulling up his
neck-cloth, and looking in the glass, whether the neighbourhood was
improved, and whether there were any _fine women_ in it, who visited our
mothers.
I had a mind to answer, "What does it signify to you whether there are
or not?" but as I dared not so reply, it was a relief to me when my
mother came in, and put a stop to his inquiries.
But never, indeed, have I since felt more jealousy than I experienced
during Seymour's residence at home, in various ways. Soon after his
return, I went with one of my cousins from Pendarves Castle, then on a
visit to us, to a public walk in a neighbouring town, which was then
much frequented, and Seymour accompanied us: I, conscious that my straw
hat and purple ribands became me, and that my young friend, who was
remarkably plain, served only as a foil to my charms.
"Now, then," thought I, "his hour is come." While glorying in this
imagined security, I was hurled down into the depths of despair; for we
scarcely reached the Mall, when we met some fine showy-looking women,
whom I thought _old_, as they seemed past five-and-twenty. Seymour, to
my great consternation, inquired who these _lovely creatures_ were,
declaring they were the handsomest women he had seen since he had left
London.
"My cousin can introduce you," said Harriet Pendarves.
"I! not I, indeed!"
"Why not, dear Helen!" cried Seymour.
"Because--because I have only lately known them."
"Oh! that is quite enough," he hastily returned; but I still refused.
However, the ladies returned, accompanied by a young man of Seymour's
acquaintance; and in a few minutes we beheld him laughing and talking
with the party. My feelings at that moment still live in my memory as
vividly as ever. I was thunder-struck. What! Seymour Pendarves, the
friend of my childhood, to leave me for women whom he never saw before;
and call them handsomer than any thing he had seen since he left London!
It was in vain that two youths of my acquaintance--one of them a young
lord--joined my deserted side: I was silent, absent, and unhappy; for
Seymour remained with his new acquaintance.
It never occurred to me to talk and laugh with my beaux, for I was a
stranger to coquetry, and the natural feelings of my heart were allowed
to display themselves: still, an untaught delicacy made me try to hide
the cause of my oddness from my companions; and a headache, which was
not feigned, was my excuse.
The ladies, however, at length left the walk, and Seymour was forced to
return to us. He immediately launched forth into rapturous praises of
their charms and elegant manners, while I listened in angry silence, as
I had expected him to apologize for leaving me; and nothing, I
perceived, was further from his thoughts.
"But what is the matter?" cried he. "Are you not well, Helen, that you
do not speak?"
"Not quite."
"Helen has a headache," said my cousin.
"Poor child!" cried Seymour kindly; "then let us go home directly; it
grows late, and I believe you do not sit up to supper yet, Helen,
except on great occasions."
Here was an affront. I angrily replied, "Indeed, Mr. Seymour Pendarves,
you seem to know very little about me, and to _care_ very little about
me now."
"_Mr._, and a tossed-up chin, and a flushed face! Why, really, Helen, I
find I did _not_ know much about you: I took you for a sweet-tempered
girl; but I have often thought you captious and pettish of late, and I
never could imagine why; but let me tell you, Miss Helen Pendarves, that
if you lose your good-temper, you will lose your greatest charm--_any_
woman's greatest _charm_."
This reproach I could not bear from him; for I knew, if I was become
pettish and captious, affection for him was the cause; and I burst into
tears. But struggling with my feelings, I sobbed out, "And I suppose,
sir, you think I _have_ no _other_ charm than my good-temper."
"_I_, Helen! No such thing: I think quite the contrary; and I do assure
you, the ladies I have just left, they----"
"O yes!" cried I, "they, I suppose, have every charm possible."
"They have great charms, certainly, both of face and person; still, they
are only _fine women_; but _you_, Helen, are quite a _little
beauty_--only you are as yet but a _child_, you know."
Away went my ill-humours, and even my jealousy; for I was sure, though
the boy of seventeen thought it more manly to talk to women grown, I
knew as he advanced in life, and I too, he would be of a different
opinion; and I also knew a few years would fade the ladies whom he so
much admired, while the same number of years would leave me still young,
and _still a beauty_. Yes, he thought me a beauty, and he had told me
so; and I repeated his words to myself so often, that in a reverie I
once spoke them aloud, and my mother asked, "Child, what are you saying
about Helen and beauty?"
"Helen was a great beauty, mamma--was she not?" said I, blushing at my
own duplicity; but the subterfuge weighed heavily on my mind, nor could
I rest till I told the whole truth to my mother, who, in consideration
of my ingenuousness, merely observed to me, that when, from the
exaggeration to which even boys were much given, Seymour called me a
beauty, he only meant I was a pretty girl: but _I_ thought
_differently_.
Seymour now remained at home full six months, with a private tutor, as
he was too old to go back to school, and Lady Helen thought him too
young for Oxford. During that time, my mother, from (as I suspected)
some private information, began to form an unfavourable opinion of his
steadiness of conduct; and the anxieties of a mother for his future
well-being clouded the still beautiful countenance of Lady Helen.
Once, as I was apparently engaged in reading, I overheard Lady Helen say
to my mother, "Do you not discern any symptoms yet of a growing
attachment on his side? he may be on his guard before me."
"None whatever: he seems to consider her still only as a beautiful
child; and she is certainly not at all more womanly in her appearance
this last year."
"I am sorry for it," was the answer; "for there is no guard so good for
the morals of a young man, as a virtuous attachment."
"Yes," said my mother; "and I had hoped, that by being so much with
Helen, he would have loved her, as it were, by anticipation."
I never could find out whether they _meant_ me to hear this conversation
or not; but the assurance which it conveyed, that Seymour did not love
me yet, was not lost upon me; and it was possible that all this was said
for that purpose. The consequence was, that I put the strictest guard
over my words and manners, lest Seymour should discover the attachment
which I had with much confidence indulged; and the attachment itself, I
resolved to resist, with all the energy possible: for surely, thought I,
if I am too young to inspire love, I ought to be too young to feel it;
and I am too proud to love where I am not beloved. And I kept the former
part of my resolution, for my attachment remained unsuspected; nor did
its strength hold out entirely uninjured against the conviction of the
utter indifference of its object. However, an affectionate grasp of my
hand, and a respectful salute of my cheek, replaced the boisterous
familiarity of his greeting, when we first met.
"Surely," said I to myself, "his feelings towards me have undergone a
change;" and while hope was thus restored to my bosom, I felt that my
former feelings would, on the slightest encouragement, return with
undiminished force.
I have since learnt--though not till long after the period in
question--that Lady Helen had thought proper to have a conversation with
her son on the subject nearest her heart; namely, a marriage between him
and me, in the course of a few years.
He listened to her, I found, with great surprise, but great complacency;
only exclaiming, "But she is such a child at present, dear mother!"
"But she will not always be a child," replied Lady Helen; "and though I
believe she is quite indifferent to you _now_, I am much mistaken if
that 'child,' as you call her, did not at your first arrival feel
something resembling love and jealousy too."
"Is it possible!" exclaimed Seymour, "and I not to be conscious of it!
_Dear_ little Helen!" And then he recollected the scene in the walk, and
my petulance, silence, and tears, for which he now accounted in a manner
flattering to his vanity; and it was so new--so _piquant_, to be loved
by a child, that he was charmed with the idea of his conquest. But then
Lady Helen had told him he had lost this affection; and as none can bear
to renounce the power which they have once possessed, he was resolved to
pay me those attentions by the want of which I had been alienated. He
was too conscious, however, to be able to act upon his resolves; and he
had learnt to consider me in so new a light, that he felt embarrassed
when he should have been assiduous; and though I saw a change in his
manner during the last four days, it was far from being a favourable
one. It was only on the last of the four days that he seemed to have
shaken off the trammels which hung about him. That day, as I was drawing
at the window, and he was reading aloud by his mother, I saw him lay
down his book, and whisper in her ear.
"Helen," said she, "what do you think Seymour says? He says, that he has
now found that you are no longer a child."
"Indeed!" replied I, blushing, but in a tone of pique: "and since when?
That is a discovery which I have long made."
"And since when have you _yourself_ made it, dear Helen?" said he, with
that saucy smile of his which you have often said was irresistible.
"These four years, at least," I answered, trying to avoid his eyes.
"Do not fib, Helen," was his impertinent reply.
"You make Helen blush, my dear son."
"So much the better; she never looks so beautiful as when she blushes,
and I dare say some little time hence, we shall have some English Priam
exclaiming of this modern Helen--
'No wonder, Britons, that such heavenly charms
For ten long years have set the world in arms!'
While _I_ shall sit and sing--
'Ah, Chloris! could I now but sit
As unconcern'd as when
Thy infant beauty could beget
Nor happiness nor pain!'"
I was now so pleased, so confounded--yet so happy, that I knew not where
to look or how to behave; but remembering that the "best part of valour
is discretion," I fled from the danger I could not face, and had just
presence of mind enough to run away.
"What is the matter with Helen?" cried Seymour, when I was gone. "Is she
angry?"
"No," replied Lady Helen, more skilled in the nature of woman's
feelings; "she is only conscious of being too well pleased--that's all;"
and from that time--had not Seymour left us the next day--the chances
are that we should soon have become lovers.
I, meanwhile, had gone into my own chamber, where I found my mother. I
threw myself into her arms, without saying a word, and hid my blushes
and my tears in her bosom. My mother, untold, knew those tears were not
tears of sorrow, and soon drew from me a part of the truth; for I told
her Seymour had been so full of his compliments that I came away.
During the course of that day, Seymour was continually exclaiming, "How
provoking it is, that I should be forced to go away just now!"
"Ah!" cried I, pertly enough, and insincerely too, "what will poor Miss
Salter do?" This was the name of one of the ladies with whom he had
fancied himself charmed.
"Miss Salter!
'I think not of Miss Salter----
My fancy has no image now but--'"
Here my mother rather pettishly interrupted him.
"I think, for Miss Salter's sake, young man, it is well you are going,
as you certainly took great pains to make her think you admired her; and
I must say, I am no friend to coquetry, be it in man or woman."
"Nor I," said Lady Helen; "and I trust the next time my son makes love,
he will do it with his whole heart, and not mistake the illusions of
fancy for the dictates of attachment."
"I trust so too, my dear mother," he replied, "and that the object will
be one whom you approve."
The next morning he set off, and every thing at first seemed a blank to
me. He wrote frequently during the first weeks of his residence at
Oxford, but my mother discouraged my answering his letters, and he soon
grew remiss in his correspondence even with Lady Helen, who found that
his allowance, though handsome, was insufficient for his wants, and
suspected that the life must be dissipated which required such an
exorbitant expenditure. My mother knew that it was so; why she imparted
what she heard to her friend, I cannot tell, because it made Lady Helen
unhappy, and she wrote to her son in the language of expostulation. I
was vexed to find that my mother gave such implicit credence to the
stories of Seymour's errors, as the accounts might be exaggerated; and
when I had once admitted that he was the victim of misrepresentation,
pity for Seymour added force to my attachment.
It seemed a very long time to me till the next vacation came; but
Seymour passed it in London, at his grandfather's; my mother was glad,
but I was disappointed. Nor did he come down into the country till half
of the long vacation was expired; and after he had spent a week with
Lady Helen, my mother took me to pay a visit to a relation of her's. In
vain Lady Helen remonstrated, and Seymour entreated; she replied she had
put off her journey in the expectation of seeing him in June, and she
could no longer delay her visit. He sighed, looked conscious and
confused, and forbore to urge her again.
My mother was certainly right in thus resolving; for she knew, though I
did not, that Lady Helen had communicated to him her views and wishes
with regard to me; and she left home with a firmness and decision of
manner which promised ill for the success of her hopes.
When we came back, Seymour was returned to Oxford. The following
Christmas, Lady Helen, whose health seemed evidently declining, went to
London for the advice of physicians, and Seymour attended her home; but
he only stayed a week, as he was under an engagement, he said, to
accompany some friends abroad. He departed, however, with evident
dejection and reluctance, and seemed while with us to enjoy the quiet of
our domestic scenes; but as his actions were not regulated by a steady
principle of _right_, and under the restraint of moral and religious
obligation, no sooner was he removed from our purifying influence, than
he became again the follower of pleasure, while as he was driven
backward and forward upon the ocean of the world, my image, which his
poor mother thought would save him from temptation, appeared to him only
as a beacon at a distance to remind him of that shore of safety which
the waves forbad him, however much he wished it, to approach. During the
next term, and in spite of his dissipation, Seymour obtained a prize for
writing the best prose essay; and he sent it to his mother just after
some very unfavourable accounts of the society which he frequented in
London, had reached her, and had been only too strongly confirmed by my
mother's secret informant. These reports had not been communicated to
me, but I happened to be present when Lady Helen received two copies of
the essay, accompanied by a letter, in which he begged that his dearest
friend Helen, would not only accept, but do him the favour to criticise
the little production which he had sent, as he knew no one whose praise
he should so highly value, or to whose censures he should pay greater
attention. Methinks I still see the delight yet gleaming mournfully
through tears, which beamed from Lady Helen's countenance when she
received the essay and read the letter. Alas! that renewed and increased
brightness was but too like the flame of an expiring taper.
"My dear Julia!" cried she to my mother, in a voice almost inarticulate
with emotion, "what a foolish thing is a fond mother's heart! Now it is
all fear, and now all hope; now it is broken, and now healed again. This
boy, this dear, naughty good boy! it was but yesterday I cried for his
weakness, and now I cry for his strength."
"No one, I believe, ever doubted your son's talents," said my mother
coldly, and I thought crossly.
"True," replied Lady Helen meekly; "and this prize, I own, is not proof
of amended conduct."
"I know not," cried I eagerly, "what fault poor Seymour has committed;
but of this I am sure, that if he was so very idle as ill-natured people
say he is, he could not have found time to write for a prize, and still
less have been able to gain it."
"Thank you, my dearest girl, for being my poor boy's advocate; for what
you say is very just: and Seymour shall know how kindly you took his
part."
"I must beg he may not know," said my mother, angrily.
"Indeed!" answered Lady Helen mournfully. "But I cannot now blame your
change of feeling on this subject, for I myself should hesitate to give
my daughter to a youth such as Seymour is said to be."
I now turned round, and looked at Lady Helen with so alarmed and
inquiring a countenance, that she could not withstand the appeal. She
took my hand, and said--
"Yes, Helen, your mother and I had pledged our words to each other, to
do all in our power to promote a union between my son and you, and to
cherish every symptom in you of a mutual attachment; but now, owing to
some too well-founded reports, I fear, of his faulty conduct, she wishes
to retract her promise; and here, as one of my last acts and deeds, (for
I feel that I shall not be with you long,) I solemnly give her back that
promise in your presence! declaring to you, my beloved child, that
unless your mother thinks Seymour deserving of you, I cannot wish you to
be his wife; and that it will be my parting injunction to you, Helen,
never, never to marry an immoral man."
Lady Helen had scarcely said this, while I listened with downcast eyes,
when my mother threw herself into her arms, sobbing out convulsively,
"My own dear generous friend! for your sake I will try to think well of
your son, and to believe he will reform--only don't talk of dying; I
can't bear _that_!"
"But I wish to prepare you for it."
"Prepare, Helen! prepare. Do you think anything can make me endure the
idea of losing you? Oh! it will be losing all I ever loved a second
time!"
Lady Helen shook her head, but did not speak; for she knew that her
friend must soon undergo this dreaded trial--and _she_, too, felt that
for _some_ blows there is no such thing as _preparation_.
The night that followed was the first of real agonizing sorrow which I
had ever known. I had heard that Seymour was believed, even by his own
mother, to be unworthy of me, and that mine was decidedly averse to that
union which she had originally made the first desire of my heart; I had
also heard from Lady Helen's own lips a solemn assurance that she was
dying.
At my time of life, however, the spirits are never long depressed,
especially by an uncertain and remote sorrow; but as a captive
butterfly, when the pressure on its wings is removed, flutters them
again in air, with all their glittering dyes and buoyancy uninjured, so
do the spirits of youth quickly resume their brilliancy and their
elasticity.
When I rose the next morning, I was _sure_ that Lady Helen would
_recover_; I was sure that Seymour would _reform_, even if the reports
concerning him were _not_ exaggerated; and I was also sure that some
time or other I should be his wife.
But, alas! Lady Helen had not spoken from momentary dejection, and still
less from the ungenerous wish to excite interest and alarm in the hearts
that tenderly loved her: she spoke from her deep conviction--a
conviction only too well founded.
In less than two months, she was attacked by fever and inflammation of
the brain, such as had before seized her on the death of her husband.
She had, however, lucid intervals; and though my mother and myself felt
our hearts wrung by her delirious ravings--during which she called upon
her son's name in the most affecting language--still we suffered more,
when, on recovering her senses, she asked for this darling son, and we
were obliged to reply that he was not yet arrived.
And where--oh! where was he, at a moment like that? We knew not.
As soon as Lady Helen's attack was judged to be a dangerous one, my
mother wrote to him at Oxford, desiring him to set off immediately, or
he might come too late; and as Oxford was only a ten hours' journey from
home, he might have been with us the next morning, had he been at
college. It was also term time; but yet he came _not_, though on such an
occasion, leave of absence was easily to be obtained. My mother was too
angry to be as wretched as I was at this distressing circumstance--for
indignation often swallows up every other feeling, and once she hinted
to me that he must have received the letter, and that mere idle neglect
kept him away; but the poor invalid, who, unsuspected by us, overheard
our conversation, exclaimed--
"No, Julia; whatever are his other faults, my poor boy loves
me--tenderly loves me; and even from a sick-bed he would hasten to his
dying mother. Oh no! he has never received your letter--he is not in
college."
"Then where is he? In college he ought to be."
"True, Julia; but he is young and thoughtless, and we ought to remember
that we were so _once ourselves_. We ought not to have run away from our
parents--yet we _did_ so, Julia."
"We did, indeed," cried my mother, abashed and silenced.
"Yes," continued Lady Helen; "and therefore I have always endeavoured to
be mild in my judgment of other people--especially of the young."
"Helen," cried my mother, "forgive me, thou blessed spirit! I will be
merciful to him, even though it makes me unjust to----"
"No, your first duty is to your daughter: but listen to me, Julia! Be
_sure_ to convince Seymour, when I am no more, that I did not impute his
absence to want of love, but merely to _accident_. Be _sure_ you do; for
he will feel only too much, when he comes and finds that he has no
longer a mother!"
The afflicting image thus presented to my mind, of what would be
Seymour's misery if he indeed arrived too late, was more than I could
bear, and I was forced to leave the room. Soon afterwards, Lady Helen's
senses wandered again; but when I returned, she was sensible, though
exhausted; and as I entered, she hastily put back the curtain, and
said--
"Oh! I hoped it was my dear, dear boy!" Her breath now grew fainter, and
she exclaimed, "Oh! where, where is he? must I die without seeing him
once more, and giving him my blessing? Helen! Julia! be sure to speak
very kindly to him, and tell him that I blessed him! But thy will, O
Lord! be done!"
Still, as long as consciousness remained, her eyes were anxiously turned
towards the door, as if looking for that beloved object whom she was
never more to see, we thought, in this world. At that moment, however,
my watchful ear heard a quick step on the stairs, and an exclamation of
agony, not mistaken by me.
"_He_ is _here_! I am _sure_ he is here!" cried I, bending over her
pillow; and in another moment Seymour was on his knees at the bedside.
Never shall I forget his look of speechless woe, when he found her last
agony approaching: but it seemed as if _affection_ struggled
successfully with death for a few short moments. She could not speak,
but her eyes were eloquent; and as she laid her hand upon the head of
her child, those eyes were raised to heaven in earnest supplication:
they then turned on him, while she reclined her head on my mother's
bosom, and her right hand was clasped in mine. I cannot go on: the scene
is still too present to my view.
* * * * *
Deep as was my affliction, it sunk into nothingness, compared with that
of the bereaved and self-reproving son. It was really a _relief_ to me
to see his sense of anguish suspended by his insensibility.