Talk about guides! Let Independence, Self-Conceit, and Go-ahead
undervalue them, if they will; but I, Sola Foemina, (for that is the
name I go by,) of Ignorance, (the place I hail from,) casting up my
unbalanced accounts, (with a view to settling,) find a large credit due
to this class of individuals, which (though I have not the means to
meet) I have no intention to repudiate.
Now and then, to be sure, I, S. F., have been reminded in my journeyings
of poor dear E., whose lively spirit was so chafed by the exactions made
upon his purse and his temper at the hands of this imperturbable race,
that at last he turned, like a stag at bay, and vented all his wrath in
the face of a startled old woman by the abrupt and emphatic query,
"What'll you take to clear out?"
Still, dogmatic and prosing as they sometimes proved, my experience on
the whole was favorable; and from the motherly old portress of the
English church at Honeybourne, who fed me with bread and butter under
her cottage-roof, and sent me away laden with garden-flowers and a
blessing, to faithful Michel, who held me over the blue fissures of the
glaciers that I might get a glimpse of their secret waterfalls, who
gathered violets for me on the margin of the icy sea, and, when I had
carelessly dropped them by the way, treasured up the faded things to
restore them to me at nightfall,--from the aged woman, with her "Good
bye till we meet in heaven," to the rough mountaineer, with his hearty
hand-pressure and God-speed at parting, I would not willingly lose one
link out of the chain of such fast friends which stretched along my way.
There is Warwick Castle,--a written history, no doubt, to scholars, a
mine of wealth to antiquaries and architects; but how incomplete would
my associations be with the spot, were you banished from the picture, my
sturdy friend, fit type of the female retainers of the household of the
King-Maker, who, stationed within the ivied approach to the castle,
presided at the brazen porridge-pot, once holding food enough to satisfy
ten score of men, now empty, save for the volume of sound which stuns
the ear when you strike it with your ponderous iron bar! Can I ever
forget the scene of laughter and riot, when you installed me within the
capacious vessel, dubbed me "Countess Guy, of the Porridge-Pot," and,
the rest of my party having been induced to accept the hospitalities of
the place, and mount my triumphal car, declared your intention to light
a fire beneath and have the finest stew in all England? The castle is a
stern place, perhaps; but how can I ever think it grim, with such a
jolly old flatterer as you stationed at its portal?
And here, in my blundering way, I have stumbled on the secret spring of
my whole subject; so I may as well make a merit of confession, and
acknowledge frankly that the trap in which these wary guides entangled
my affections was generally neither more nor less than a net of silken
flattery. Your good guide, your dear guide, your pet guide, whom
Neighbor So-and-so, going abroad, must look up immediately on his
arrival, this invaluable creature, depend upon it, is an arrant
flatterer. He does not go out of his way for you; he does not tell it
you to your face; but, somehow or other, (if he knows his vocation,) he
makes you believe, that, of all the travellers he ever escorted, (and he
has been a travellers' escort from his infancy,) you are the first, the
only one, in whose behalf duty became a privilege.
Do you suppose I put faith in Michel, when, on my second Alpine
excursion, this companion of the previous day's peril placed himself in
close proximity to my mule, took the bridle with an air of satisfaction,
and whispered with an insinuating smile, "I go with _you_ to-day; see,
there is another guide for Mademoiselle"? He was mistaken. It was my
young friend whom he was, on this occasion, destined to escort over the
mountain. He was as devoted to her as if she had been the apple of his
eye. Whether I followed next in the file, brought up the rear, or was
dashed over the precipice, I doubt if he looked behind him to discover.
Was I fool enough, then, to trust his professions? I acknowledge the
weakness. I was but a novice, he a practised courtier in the guise of a
mountaineer. To make a clean breast of it, I even suspect that his
self-gratulatory whisper is still ringing in my ear, for I find that
Mademoiselle and I are rivals in our devotion to Michel.
And Ann Harris, of Honeybourne, widow, portress of the ancient
village-church, surrounded by villagers' graves, approached by four
foot-paths over four stiles, perfect model of all the churches in all
the novels of English literature,--was it partiality for me, ancient
matron, or an eye to a silver sixpence, which made you, and makes you
still, the heroine of my day of romance? At any rate, I shall never
cease to invoke a blessing on that immaculate railway-company which
decoyed me from London into the heart of England, and, with a coolness
unexampled in the new districts of Iowa, dropped me at the sweetest nook
under the sun, there to wait three hours for the train which should have
taken me at once to Stratford,--three golden hours, in which I might
bask like a bee in a Honeybourne beyond my hopes.
Not that my Honeybourne was precisely the spot where the railway-train
left me standing deserted and alone,--alone save for a Stratford
furniture-dealer, who, unceremoniously set down in the midst of his new
stock of tables and chairs, and with nothing else in sight but a
platform, a shed, and me, looked at the last-mentioned object for
sympathy, while he cursed the departing train and swore the usual oath
of vengeance, namely, that he would never travel that road again.
_He_ got red with passion and cursed the road; _I_ stared round me and
kept cool. Was I more philosophical than he? No, but there was this
difference: he was bent on business, I on pleasure; he was in a hurry, I
could afford to wait.
Three hours,--and only a platform, a shed, and an infuriated
furniture-dealer to keep me company! This was the Honeybourne station,
but not Honeybourne. I found a railway-official hard by, had my baggage
stowed in the shed, crossed the platform, looked at my watch to make
sure of the time, then struck out into the open country. Through shady
lanes, over stiles, across the fields, on I went, in the direction
pointed out to me by two laborers whom I met at starting. The sweet
white may smiled at me from the hedges; the great sober eyes of the
cattle at pasture reflected my sense of contentment; the nonchalant
English sheep showed no signs of disturbance at my approach (unlike the
American species, which invariably take to their heels); the children
set to watch them lifted their heads from the long grass and looked
lazily after me, never doubting my right to tread the well-worn
foot-path with which every green field beguiled me on. I came out in the
vegetable-garden of a rustic cottage, one of some dozen thatched-roofed
dwellings, which, with the church and simple parsonage, constituted
sweet Honeybourne. "Oh that it were the bourne from which no traveller
returns!" was the thought of my heart, as, with a dreamy sense of
longings fulfilled, I wandered through the miniature village, across it,
around it, beyond it, and back to it again, as a bee saturated with
sweets floats round the hive.
And now to my queen-bee, Ann Harris, aforesaid!
"All the way from Lunnon! Alone, and such a distance! Bless my heart!"
cried the primitive Ann, with hands and eyes uplifted. "Come in and rest
you, and have something to eat! I have bread and butter, sweet and good,
and will boil the kettle and make you a cup of tea, if you say so."
I had already made the circuit of the church, strolled among the ancient
gravestones, crossed the moss-covered bridge, threaded the paths beneath
the hawthorn, had a vision of boundless beauty, drunk in the silence,
and dreamed out my dream of solitude, independence, and the joy of being
no one but myself knew where. Could I do better than accept this
invitation to enter the humble cottage, with the prospect of an
admittance also to an old woman's heart? Did I win the latter? or did I
only fancy it? Did the motherly creature believe me lost? or was her
astonishment only feigned? Was she really, despite her poverty, ready to
share her last crust with a stranger? or was the benignant glance which
gave me in my loneliness the sense of adoption merely an eye to
self-interest?
Dear old soul! One of us, at least, was simple-hearted and true,--either
she in her innocent professions, or I in my silly credulity. I have
faith that it was she. At all events, I do so cherish the memory of her
kindness, that, so far from treasuring the notion of the silver
sixpence, I hereby pledge myself, that, if ever the reminiscence I am
penning should be worth half as much to me in gold as it is in memory, I
will send Ann Harris at least one shining guinea, as a token how
willingly I would go shares with her in something.
And the guinea would not come amiss, for Ann was poor; her clay-floored
cottage boasted only its exquisite neatness, her furniture was of the
humblest, her dress the cheapest. She was too old for hard work; her
duties at the little church were light,--the profits, I fear, were
lighter; for that visitors to the remote sanctuary were rare her
reception of me was sufficient proof. As she guided me through the
church, I asked her if it was well attended. She shook her head sadly,
and, pointing in the direction of a neighboring village, answered,--
"Most of 'em go to chapel, yonder,--the more's the pity."
She told me that she had no provision for the coming winter, and feared
she must go to the Union. (It was not our own, then prosperous and
unbroken, Union, to which she dreaded emigrating.) She merely meant the
work-house; and as she spoke, her face wore a shadow that still clouds
my recollections of Honeybourne. I do not know if her fears were
realized,--if her cottage is forsaken,--if she dwells among paupers, or
sleeps in the village church-yard; but I cannot think of her as lonely
or poor or dead. Her saintly face told of blessed communion; I know that
she was rich in faith and hope; and were I assured that her spirit had
left the flesh, I should only picture her to myself standing erect at
heaven's doorway, welcoming strangers with the same serenity with which
she said to me at parting,--"I shall meet you _there_."
She offered me a farewell gift of flowers from her garden. It was a
beautiful cottage-garden, and many of the flowers were brilliant and
even rare, giving proof of careful, if not scientific culture. Still I
hesitated. My hands were full of sweet may, red campion, and other
native field-blossoms, which had introduced themselves to me
anonymously. They were the children of the green sod which I had been
treading so lightly on my way to the village; and, in the quiet of my
ramble, they had seemed to me like whispers from Him who made them, and
with whom I had never felt so utterly alone. I could not bear to see
them displaced by Ann's garden-belles, tempting as the latter would have
been at any other moment. She saw my indifference to her offer. I knew
she saw it working in my face. I attempted to apologize for my
preference, but she did not understand me; so I blurted out my thought,
awkwardly enough, saying,--
"Yours are beautiful; but God made these, you know,--and--and--I like
them best."
She looked down upon me gravely, pityingly, smiling, too, with a
tenderness which was neither grave nor pitying. I have seen
long-visioned people look with just that expression at the eyes of the
short-sighted, on the latter's confessing their inability to detect an
object at no great distance.
"_He made them all_," she said; and her words were an ascription of
praise.
They come to me often now. They bid me look farther and see more. They
tell me how _mine_ and _thine_ have no place in this world of _His_.
False distinctions shrink away from the light of the old woman's clearer
faith; I see how the ablest workers are but instruments in higher
hands,--how science, culture, inspiration itself, are but gifts to be
laid on His altar.
I need scarcely say that I at once found room for Ann's flowers in my
hand, as for her lesson in my heart. Some of the former are pressed and
laid away as a sacred memento, and something of the latter is treasured
up among good seed sown by the way-side.
I would gladly have lingered longer in this little nook, into which I
seemed to have been drifted by chance; but my time was up,--I had a mile
or two to walk over the fields in the direction of the railway,--my
friends were to meet me at Stratford. Should I miss the train this time,
my philosophy might fail me as signally as that of the above-mentioned
furniture-dealer failed him.
A few hours after I bade my old friend farewell, I was at my
destination. Millions have shared my experiences at the tomb of the
great poet. Everybody is familiar with William Shakspeare and
Stratford-on-Avon, but I hug the thought that nobody but I knows
anything about Ann Harris and Honeybourne.
* * * * *
I have dwelt upon an occasion in which the humble office of a guide
resulted in companionship, friendship, instruction. A brief sojourn in
Alpine regions has furnished me with a similar reminiscence.
We were setting forth for a day's ride across the Tête-Noire. Our party
consisted of five, and we had two guides. Our baggage, which was for the
most part light, was strapped on the backs of the mules behind the
riders. One article, however, a square box of considerable proportions,
proved refractory, and, veering from side to side, refused to maintain
the even balance which, owing to the rough nature of the bridle-path,
was essential to the safety of both mule and rider. We were obliged to
halt again and again, that the box might be restrapped, always with
doubtful success. Each time that we drew up in line for this purpose we
were overtaken by a Swiss youth, who had perceived our dilemma, and who
hoped, by following us up closely, to make a job out of it. There was
but a limited knowledge of French among us, (the language in which the
youth spoke,) still, by aid of his vehement gestures, he made us
understand that he was ready, for a consideration, to accompany us on
our toilsome journey, and carry the box on his back.
"Eight francs, Monsieur,--I will do it for eight francs!" But the box
was righted, his services seemed superfluous, and we moved on,
regardless of his beseeching looks.
A fresh delay soon ensued, the boy came panting up, and this time it was
"Seven francs,"--nay, as we rode away from him, he frantically shouted,
"Six!" His prospects seemed hopeless, but destiny and perseverance were
on his side,--the box gave another alarming lurch,--the heated and
almost discouraged youth made one last appeal,--
"Four francs, Monsieur! I will do it for four francs!" and the day was
his.
He was not a regular guide, appointed by Government and furnished with a
certificate, as is the law of the Alpine district for all who serve in
this responsible capacity. We had engaged him simply as a porter. Still,
the docile youth had no sooner strapped the box on his back than, seeing
that I was the only lady unprovided with an attendant, he drew my mule's
bridle through his arm, and quietly took me in charge.
No matter how charming a travelling-party you belong to, the moment they
are all mounted and climbing a mountain, single file, you feel yourself
a unit in creation. Everybody has turned his back upon you, and you have
turned your back upon everybody. You are a solitary traveller. Are you
aghast at your own situation on the steep slope of a mule's back, with a
precipice above your head and your feet dangling over a gulf below?
There is no help for it. Imagine yourself a sack of meal, if you can,
and expect as little sympathy as would be accorded to that article. Are
you moved to a keen sense of the ridiculous, as a curve in the road
discloses the figures of your elongated party, unused to riding, and
rendered the more grotesque by their mountain-equipment? A laugh
unshared is no laugh at all, so you may as well smother it at once. Does
the scenery through which you are passing awaken emotions of sublimity?
It would be sacrilege to shout out your sentiments to the occupant of
the next mule in such tones as a watchman would employ to cry, "Fire!"
No,--if you are essentially a social creature, there is nothing for it
but to bottle up your sensibilities and await the opportunity for an
explosion when you reach your inn.
Something like this result occurred, I remember, on the evening of that
very day, when Mademoiselle, who, under the charge of Michel, led the
van, met me at the hotel at Martigny, at which place she had of course
arrived a little in advance. We were not usually more demonstrative in
our manners than is customary among New-England women, but the moment I
could alight we rushed into each other's embrace, regardless of a crowd
of astonished porters and guides, mutually insisting, by way of apology,
that it seemed as if we had not met for a year.
Having dwelt upon this peculiar isolation experienced by the Alpine
traveller, it may be conjectured, that, when the boy, Auguste, drew my
bridle through his arm, I felt very much as Robinson Crusoe did when he
was joined by his man Friday. Auguste and I soon became friends. He was
a large, round-faced, mild-eyed youth, who, the instant the excitement
of securing his employment was past, subsided into a soft, even pace
like that of a dog. Now and then, too, he looked up at the mule and me,
precisely as a dog, accompanying his master, looks up to see if all is
right.
I did not talk to him at first. His mere presence was satisfaction
enough. After a while we grew more sociable. He spoke a French _patois_.
So did I. His was peculiar to the province,--mine wholly original,--but
both answered the purpose of communication, and so were satisfactory.
He had the essential characteristic of his profession,--he was one of
the oily-tongued tribe, simple as he seemed, and I the willing victim;
for I am confident that I straightened in my saddle, and talked more
glibly than ever in the language peculiar to myself, on the strength of
his _naïve_ surprise at learning the place of my nativity, and his
polite exclamation, "_De l'Amèrique! O! j'avais cru que vous étiez de
Paris_!"
The conversation you hold with your guide has this advantage,--you can
suspend it at will. There are miles of travel, in crossing the
Tête-Noire, when, if your most sympathizing friend walked beside you,
the thought of both hearts would be, "Let all the earth keep silence!"
and in the absence of such unspoken sympathy, the next best thing is the
innocent gravity of an attendant hired for so many francs a day, and not
presuming to speak unless spoken to.
But when these sublimer passages are passed, when the path skirts the
edge of the valley, when the giant mountains have retired a little and
you slacken the tense cord of emotion which for a while has held you
spell-bound, it is a relief to loosen the tongue also, and reassure
yourself with the sound of the human voice. Thus Auguste and I had
frequent dialogues. He told me something of his past life, which I do
not remember very well. I think its chief incident was his having been
drafted for the army, and having served his term. Of his future,
however, he spoke with an earnestness which has left its impression on
my mind. He said that the next winter he meant to go to Paris and seek a
service; and his perseverance in wringing employment out of us inclines
me to think that he fulfilled his intention. Savoy, to which province he
belonged, had just been annexed to France. A party of guides from
Chamouni had the day before succeeded, with difficulty, in planting the
imperial flag on the summit of Mont Blanc. Was it this which had
awakened the ambition of the young Savoyard to share the spoils of the
empire of which he had so suddenly become a member? Perhaps (I never
thought of it before, but perhaps) he was already seeking means for his
journey to the capital. Perhaps the price of his hard-won service was to
be the nucleus of his savings. Have I, then, aided your purpose,
Auguste? helped to transform you from a simple mountain-lad to a mere
link in a chain of street-sweepers, an artful official of a third-rate
billiard-saloon, or a roystering cab-driver with his perpetual entreaty
for an extra fee in the form of "_Quelque chose à boire_"? My mind
shrinks from the possibility, for I cannot bear to think of him as other
than he then seemed,--a child of Nature and of the truth.
In the course of our day's journey we drew near a little village. I had
been chatting with Auguste and felt in a loquacious mood, but paused as
I found myself passing through the village,--in other words, sneaking
round the corner of one shabby hut, and straight through the farm-yard
of the next, and close by the windows of a third,--the three, and a few
other stray buildings, constituting the hamlet. As it seemed an
impertinence to follow such an intrusive, inquisitive little road at
all, we could, of course, do no less than maintain a dumb propriety in
the presence of the children and kitchen-utensils, but, as we left them
behind and struck across an open field, my eye fell on one of those
way-side shrines common in all Roman-Catholic districts. It was a
miniature arch of plastered or whitewashed stone, and contained, as
nearly as I could judge from the glimpse I had in passing, two coarse
dolls, intended to represent the Virgin and Child.
"What is that, Auguste?" I asked, with feigned ignorance.
"A place of worship," he answered; "the people come there to pray."
"But what do they come _there_ for?" I continued.
"_God is there_," he answered, with emphasis, pointing at the same time
to the gayly dressed puppets.
"No, He is not," I replied.
He turned round and looked at me defiantly. His mild face became that
of a fanatic, and I actually quailed beneath his angry eye, as he
retorted,--
"He _is_ there."
My mistake flashed upon me, too, at the instant, and I hastened to
explain myself in the simplest manner my poor French would allow,
saying,--
_"Oui, Auguste, Il est là, c'est vrai; mais Il est là aussi!"_--and I
pointed to the snow-capped mountains on my right,--_"et là!"_--and I
waved my hand towards the deeply shadowed heights on the opposite side
of the valley.
He caught my meaning as by an inspiration. His fierce frown melted
instantly into an intelligent smile.
_"Il est partout!"_ exclaimed the youth, with enthusiasm, his childlike,
eager eyes seeking a response in mine.
I nodded in affirmation of the truth. It was enough. Catholic and
Protestant had met on common ground,--we understood each other,--we were
reconciled.
Has he carried his large faith with him into the great metropolis? and
have I kept mine unshaken in spite of the storm that is raging in my
native land? Armed in his simplicity only, he has gone to meet the gusts
of temptation; and I have lived to see the Republic, which I believed
inviolable as Mother Earth herself, tremble and totter, as one after
another of her rotten pillars has fallen away. God grant that we may
both, in this day of our peril, be able, as then, to realize that "_Il
est partout_"!
During my short Alpine journey I held the office of paymaster for our
party, my election being due not so much to proficiency in the queer
dialect above alluded to as to courage in the use of it. It is always a
pleasant office to disburse the funds, but was never more so than when,
late at night, Michel and Auguste came to the hotel at Martigny to
receive the reward of their day's toil. Michel had his full dues in
money, and plenty of praise to boot; Auguste, evidently much to his
surprise, a trifle more than his minimum price. Each of them then
grasped my hand in his horny palm,--an unexpected salutation, but not a
harsh one, for each hand had a heart in it, or I believed it had, which
was all the same to me. They made the customary promise not to forget
me, but credulity must stop somewhere, and at this point I must confess
my easy faith gave out, and left me skeptical.
* * * * *
I have given the preference in order of narrative, as well as in memory,
to guides who proved competent, willing, and true, who, if they seasoned
the intercourse between us with a little encouragement to my
self-esteem, had nothing in them obsequious or timeserving, and who set
me a wholesome example of clear convictions and firmness in the
maintenance of right. But not only are the virtues of the race whom I
have chosen for a theme subjects of congratulation; even the
uncertainties and misfits of these frequently rusty keys to the past
excite a mirth that lightens the toil with which one rummages through
the corridors of time. It would be treason to tell the name of that
antique university-chapel where a certain wooden-headed verger was
betrayed into the absurdest error; it would be personal to give the name
of the waggish friend who made him his innocent butt; but the facts and
the joke claim no disguise.
The solemn British beadle had been rehearsing the history of numerous
sarcophagi and monuments, dwelling with mingled pathos and indignation
upon the injuries which the chapel, its railings, and its statues had
sustained at the hands of that arch-destroyer and his soldiery who, in
their zeal for the new Commonwealth, trampled brutally upon the records
of past grandeur and royalty.
"He stabled his 'osses 'ere! yes, 'ere,--in this wery chapel! ugh!" was
the wrathful exclamation of our guide; and as he pointed towards the
tablets without corners and the effigies lacking noses or feet, there
was a low muttering in his throat and a look at us intended to excite
sympathetic ire on our part.
One only of our party responded to the look.
"Let me see,--Cromwell was a terrible Catholic, wasn't he?" gravely
inquired our fellow-traveller, as if in this way, and this way only,
could the sacrilege be accounted for,--one blue eye, as he spoke, full
of sage earnestness, the other twinkling with fun.
The stolid face of our guide now became a study. He had no instructions
for such an emergency as this. The question had made war with his poor
wits. For a moment they staggered, felt themselves defeated, and were
about to surrender. But, resolute Briton that he was, the old man soon
rallied his forces. True servant both of Church and State, he saw that
there was no consistent course for him but to consign the enemy of
royalty and the contemner of sacred monuments to the abominable Scarlet
Lady. He gave one appealing look at his interrogator, but the side of
the face turned towards him was immovable. It gave no positive
discouragement to an affirmative reply; it even feigned ignorance.
Seeking enlightenment, and taking heart of faith, the verger assented in
the words, "Y-e-e-e-s,--I be-e-e-lieve so!" Then, his courage rising as
he felt himself committed to the fact, he continued, with emphasis and a
dictatorial nodding of the head, "Yes,--yes, he _was_."
Many and laughable are the instances of such perplexity and mistake
among the aged pieces of mechanism who have for years been sounding the
same tune to generations of unquestioning ears, and who, not having an
extra note in their gamut, can by no means bear to be played upon by
strange hands. Age has its exemptions and immunities, however; might
makes right, and one who has long been a dictator comes to be deemed an
infallible authority. So they whine on, and are oftener believed than
otherwise. As they constitute a class, and those whom I have to do with
are chiefly the exceptions, I will forbear to dwell on stereotyped
specimens, and turn to one so unlike the generality of her tribe, so
utterly lawless, so completely at variance with all her surroundings,
that I must beg leave to introduce her precisely as she introduced
herself.
* * * * *
There is an old place in England (there may be many such, but I know
there is one) which is consecrated to imagination, romance, and memory.
Abandoned by its owners as a residence, it is nevertheless maintained in
sufficient repair to prevent its walls from crumbling or its beauty of
outline from being marred, and stands forth a living epic, written in
stone and oak, and meriting a place among the classics of the land.
The favorite of tourists, artists, and antiquaries, it can well dispense
with anything like an accurate description from a traveller who went
thither, not to study, but to muse; so, putting in a plea, beforehand,
for possible failures in observation and memory, I propose to myself
nothing more than a re-indulgence of the reverie which took possession
of me on my visit to Haddon Hall.
We had spent the middle hours of the day at Chatsworth, that palace and
museum of modern art, and, with senses bewildered and eyes dazzled by
the magnificence of a ducal residence unparalleled, perhaps, in the
world for its wealth and culture, we had set off, in the latter part of
the afternoon, to view its antipodes. The circumstances and the hour
were not inappropriate. Sated with the most perfect display of luxury
and taste which the present age can boast, and somewhat weary with the
toil of sight-seeing, a six-mile drive, the gradual decline of the
summer day, the shadows gathering over the landscape, all acted as a
gentle narcotic, and were a fit preparative for our approach to that
old, deserted homestead, the first glimpse of which set my fancy
roaming, and carried me away into a world of dreams.
Hitherto I had been the contented occupant of an old yellow coach, and
had been satisfied with the pace of two jaded post-horses. But, as I
crossed the drawbridge and climbed the steep hill which led to the
principal gateway, I found myself mounted on rapid wings, and whirling
through the centuries. Not that I was rushing on in advance of the age.
No,--the wings flapped backwards, they careered disdainfully over and
beyond the region of reality; as we flew, the present became merged in
the past, the actual gave place to the ideal.
I am approaching a feudal fortress. The deep moat, the turreted walls,
the old gray towers, the lattice of my lady's bower, the sentry pacing
the battlements, the warder stationed at the gate, the severe exterior
of the grim pile, the smoking hospitality that reigns within,--I
recognize them all. Much that I have taken on faith from my childhood
has already been realized since I touched English shores,--why not this?
I climb the steep slope leading to the principal entrance, and knock at
the gate. Hark! is not that the sound of an answering horn? Is not that
distant rattling the clash of armor on the stones? Do I not hear the
voice of the stout baron mustering his retainers to bid me welcome? If
so, they are a long time about it,--for I have knocked once, twice,
three times, and there is no admittance. It is a severe process, too;
for, though the original gate, which may have been an iron portcullis
for aught I know, has given place to rough boards, the latter are not
particularly tender of my knuckles, and, though romance is romance, pain
is a fact. So I fold my airy wings for the present, and look about me
for a big stone to pound with. It is of no use. The old castle is deaf
and dumb. It neither hears nor answers. I creep along the edge of a
steep bank, pry round a corner of the building, gaze up at the high
Gothic windows, but see nothing like a practicable approach, and turn
back, discouraged. We take counsel together, I and my party, and at
length condescend to the belief that our best hope of obtaining an
entrance lies in a modern farm-house, at the foot of the eminence on
which the fortress stands. The farm-house is beyond the hail of our
voices, but our coachman, who is stationed there with his post-chaise, a
witness of our embarrassment, makes an encouraging sign. That the
farm-house bears some relation to the manor-house is suggested also by
the fact that its garden boasts a yew-tree cut into the form of a
peacock, and the book of heraldry says that the crest of the noble Earls
of Rutland, who occupied the hall for centuries, includes, among its
other belongings, "a peacock, in pride, proper."
At last, just as our impatience had reached the verge of indignation, a
little figure emerged from the shadow of the farm-house, and sauntered
towards us. She was a pretty child, a true daughter of the Saxon race,
fair-haired, blue-eyed, and sunny-complexioned. She was the pink of
neatness, too, and it was evident that the time we had spent in waiting
had been passed by her at her toilet, for the folds were still fresh in
her snowy apron, and her golden hair glistened smoothly within the bars
of a net,--that unfailing net, sure emblem of British female
nationality. Her dainty little hat was trimmed with white ribbons, which
streamed behind her in the breeze, and, altogether, she was as complete
a picture as one would wish to see of youth, health, and
self-complacency.
The nonchalance with which she approached us was a thing I have never
seen equalled. The independence of American children is proverbial; but
democratic institutions never produced anything more saucily
self-reliant than this little Briton. Without looking at us, or deigning
any apology for the great gate,--which, it seems, is a mere barricade,
not made to be opened,--she unlocked a side-postern, a rude door,
consisting of two or three rough boards, and made a motion for us to
enter. As we trod the time-worn pavement of the outer court, and gained
an open quadrangle round which various apartments were grouped,
imagination once more took possession of me, and I found myself peopling
the place with its original inmates.
"Oh, how old and story-like!" I exclaimed to my companions. "Can you not
imagine knights on horseback prancing over these stones, and alighting
at the great hall-door beyond?"
"Horses never came up here!" was the interruption which my suggestion
met from our practical little guide. "Horses couldn't climb those
stairs," she added, somewhat scornfully; and I then observed that I had
unconsciously ascended a rough, angular stairway, passable only to
foot-passengers.
Knights on foot, then, my fancy at once substituted; and as the child,
now commencing her duties as show-woman, pointed out the servants'
offices, it was no difficult matter to picture the baron's retainers
lazily grouped around the stone walls of the low cells, for such the
apartments were, polishing their master's armor, or bousing over jugs of
ale, while handsome pages loitered about the court-yard, waiting the
summons of their lord, or the sound of their lady's silver whistle.
Fancy was an indispensable attendant in making the circuit of the
apartments, which surrounded at least three sides of this outer
quadrangle. Without her aid, they were simply remarkable for their
similarity, their vacancy, their unfitness for any modern purpose save
that of sheep-pens or lumber-rooms. Destitute of windows, so that the
sun and air found admittance only through the doorway, without
fireplaces, boarded floors, or plastered walls, they presented simply so
many square feet of space walled in by stone and mortar. But Fancy had
the power to enliven, furnish, people them. She suggested that their
very number was an indication of sociability, excitement, noise, and
mirth. Here, as in all feudal dwellings, the vast disproportion between
the space allotted to the dependents and that reserved for the lord of
the manor pointed to the time when each castle was a walled city, each
baronial hall the home of a crowd of petty retainers. In that long-ago,
what multitudes of voices had stirred the silence of the court-yard! The
bare walls of the apartments then were hung with breast-plate, spear,
and cross-bow,--trophies of war and the chase furnished decorations
suited to the taste of the occupants, and the hides of slaughtered
beasts carpeted the cold floor. Stirring tales of love and warfare
gathered little knots of listeners; wandering minstrels sought
hospitality, and repaid it in songs and rhymes; the beef and the bowl
went round; my lord's jester made his privileged way into every circle
in turn, and cracked his jokes at everybody's expense; and pretty Bess,
my lady's maid, peeped in at the open door, just in time to join in the
laugh against her lover.
But Fancy only whispered, and another little attendant, whose name was
Fact, spoke out, and interrupted her.
"Would you like to see the family-plate?" asked our guide, with the air
of one who felt she had really nothing worth showing, but was bound to
fulfil her task; and, entering one of the stone-walled apartments, she
pointed out a few enormous pewter platters, much dimmed by time and
neglect, leaning against the wall.
What visions of Christmas feasts and wassails these relics might have
awakened in me, had I been left to gaze on them undisturbed, it is
impossible to say; but my mind was not permitted to follow its own bent.
"There's nicer ones down at the house, all brightened up," said the
child, with simplicity, and looking disdain at the heirlooms she was
displaying.
The estimate put by the little girl upon the comparative value of old
pewter dishes was suggestive. Whether the farm-house had robbed the
castle, or the castle the farm-house, became at once an open question,
and romance died in doubt.
There could be no doubt, however, as to the genuineness of the rude old
dining-hall to which we were conducted next. The clumsy oaken table
still occupied the raised end of the apartment, where the baron feasted
his principal guests. The carved and panelled gallery whence his
minstrels cheered the banquet still stood firm on its massive pillars,
and the great stags'-antlers which surmounted it told of his skill as a
sportsman. What giant logs might once have burned in the wide
fireplaces, what sounds of revelry have gone up to the bare rafters! Our
guide's tongue went glibly as she pointed out these familiar objects,
and in the kitchen, buttery, and wine-vault, which were situated
conveniently near to the dining-hall, she seemed equally at home. It was
easy to recognize in the great stone chimneys, with their heavy hooks
and cross-bars, symptoms of banquets for which bullocks were roasted
whole and sheep and calves slain by the dozen; but we needed her
practised lips to suggest the uses of the huge stone chopping-blocks,
the deeply sunk troughs, the narrow gutters that crossed the stone
pavement, all illustrative of the primitive days when butcher and cook
wrought simultaneously, and this contracted cellar served at once for
slaughter-house and kitchen. Her little airy figure was in strange
contrast with these gloomy passages, these stones that had reeked with
blood and smoke. She glided before us into the mysterious depths of the
storehouse and ale-vault, as the new moon glides among damp, black
clouds; as she directed our attention to the oaken cupboards for bread
and cheese, the stone benches that once supported long rows of casks,
the little wicket in the doorway, through which the butler doled out
provisions to a waiting crowd of poor, she might well have been likened
to a freshly trimmed lamp, lighting up the dark, mysterious past.
Freshly trimmed she unquestionably was, and by careful hands, but not a
voluntary light; for, the moment her explanations were finished, or our
curiosity satisfied, she sank into an indifference of speech and
attitude which proved her distaste to a place and a task utterly foreign
to her nature. Evidently, the hall which we had come so far to see, and
were so eager to explore, was at once the most familiar object of her
life and her most utter aversion. She had been drilled into a mechanical
knowledge of its history, but the place itself was to her what an old
grammar or spelling-book is to the unwilling pupil,--a thing to be
learned by rote, to be abused, contemned, escaped from. As we finished
our exploration of the lower floor, she probably breathed a sigh of
relief, feeling that the first chapter of her task was concluded.
But a second and more difficult was yet to follow,--for we now ascended
a staircase of uncemented blocks of stone, crossed a passage, and found
ourselves in a long gallery or hall, the finest and best-preserved room
in the castle, the state-apartment and ball-room of the lords of the
manor. Our admiration at once broke forth in words of surprise and
delight. The architecture of this room was of much more recent date than
that portion of the building which we had already visited. It was
Elizabethan in its style, and one of the finest specimens of the period.
It was floored and wainscoted with oak; its frieze richly carved and
adorned with boars' heads, thistles, and roses; its ceiling, also of
oak, beautifully panelled and ornamented. There was a great square
recess in the middle of the gallery, and along one side of it a row of
bow-windows, through whose diamond panes a fine view was afforded of the
quaint old garden and balconies below. Here, doubtless, knights and
dames of the olden time had danced, coquetted, quarrelled, and been
reconciled. Within those deep embrasures courtiers in ruffs and plumes
had sued for ladies' favors, and plotted deep intrigues of state. What
stories these walls could tell, had they but tongues to speak! What
dreams did their very silence conjure up!
Led by a more erratic spirit than that even of our child-guide, I am
afraid I lent an inattentive ear to her accurate statement of the
length, breadth, and height of the gallery in which we stood, the
precise date of its erection, the noble owners of the various
coats-of-arms carved above the doorway; for I remember only that she
seemed confident and well-informed, and recited her lesson faithfully
so long as she was suffered to follow the beaten track. How impossible
it was to extract anything beyond that from her we soon had proof.
She ushered us next into my lord's parlor, which nearly adjoined the
gallery. This room was hung with arras, retained a few articles of
ancient furniture, had one or two pictures hanging on its walls, and
presented, altogether, a more habitable look than any other portion of
the castle. Our little maid had got on well with her description of this
room, had pointed out the portrait of Prince Arthur, once a resident at
the hall, had introduced that of Will Somers, my lord's jester, as
glibly as if Will were a playmate of her own, had deciphered for us the
excellent moral precept carved in old English beneath the royal arms,
"Drede God and honour the King," and was proceeding rapidly with an
array of measurements and dates, when I unluckily interrupted her,--I
think it was to ask some question about the tapestry. She looked at me
reproachfully, indignantly,--just as a child reciting the
multiplication-table before the School-Committee would look, if tripped
up between the numbers, or as a boy, taken advantage of in play, might
cry, "No fair!" She did not condescend to answer me, perhaps she could
not, but paused a moment, reflected, went deliberately back in her
recital, repeated the last few dates and phrases by way of gaining an
impetus, and then went on without faltering to the end of her prescribed
narration.
Poor child! She had my sympathy, and has still. What a grudge she must
owe us tourists, even the tamest and most submissive of us, for whom she
is thus compelled to tax her unwilling memory!
But if her spirits were damped, her good-humor threatened, it was for a
minute only. Upon completing our rapid survey of my lord's parlor, and
looking round for the guide who should conduct us farther, she had
become invisible. So we moved on without her, and commenced exploring a
narrow passage with a certain sense of bewilderment at its loneliness,
and the doubt whither it might lead, when, suddenly, we were startled by
a merry laugh, which seemed to ring through the air directly above our
heads. Was it a mocking spirit that haunted the place? or one of the old
figures on the tapestry, started into life? We looked up, and there, on
a rough platform of pine boards, projecting from the wall, stood our
Fenella. She was leaning over the shoulder of an artist-boy, who, seated
at his easel, was copying one of the Gorgon-heads that stood out on the
faded tapestry. She had dismissed us wholly from her thoughts, and,
giving play to her native fun and coquetry, was taunting the youth with
the slowness of his labors and the little progress he had made since she
last inspected his work. No wonder that she laughed at the taste of the
boy or his employer. Graver heads than hers might question the motive
which had set the painter such a model. Imagination suggested that some
elfin godmother must have prescribed the task as a condition of her
future favor. At all events, the malicious sprite now acting as overseer
felt a sense of triumph in this captive boy, perched against the wall,
and condemned, like herself, to reproduce the past and bring out in
fresh colors the staring eyes and mummied cheeks which would otherwise
soon be lost to memory. She certainly made the most of her opportunity
to taunt and tease him, for there was time for a laugh and a word of
raillery only, to which he seemed too shamefaced to respond, before she
was at our side again, gravely announcing, "My lady's chamber!"--and as
we looked around the apartment, whose furniture and decorations imparted
to it a superior air of neatness and refinement to that observable
elsewhere, she pointed out to us a private doorway, conducting to a
flight of steps, and affording an exit by which "my lady" had easy
access to the court-yard, and thence to the chapel where she performed
her devotions.
"And what are the rooms opposite?" we asked, pointing to a long row of
windows on the second floor, on the opposite side of the quadrangle to
that of which we had now completed the inspection.
"Those rooms are never shown," was the mysterious answer.
"But you will show them to _us_" (spoken coaxingly).
She shook her head, and sealed her lips, with an expression of
determination.
"What is in them?"
"Oh, nothing in particular."
"Then we might see them."
No encouragement, but, on the contrary, a resolute negative.
A bribe was held out,--for, by this time, the child's air of mystery and
reserve had suggested a closet like that of Bluebeard, a chamber of
torture, or, at least, the proofs of some family-secret.
We might as well have offered a two-shilling bribe to the Iron Duke
himself. The miniature castle-keeper was so firm and so non-committal
that she disarmed us of all our ingenuity, defeated all our tactics, and
we gave up the point. I have since learned that this quarter of the
mansion consists of a labyrinth of rooms, shut up because devoid of
interest, and containing only some old lumber. To have conducted us
through them would have been to disobey orders, and, worse still,
establish a precedent, from which the child might well shrink. It would
have doubled her arduous round of duty. It was policy, no less than
loyalty, which had inspired her.
So, too, when we came to inspect the chapel. She mounted an old oak
chest in the rear of the little sanctuary, just beneath the solitary
window, whose quaint patterns in stained glass pointed to centuries long
past. Seated comfortably on this elevation, she rehearsed the history
and described the architecture of the most primitive place of worship I
ever saw,--or, if she left her post to point out some minuter detail,
she returned to it as jealously as a watch-dog to some spot which he is
specially appointed to guard. When our curiosity was otherwise
satisfied,--when we had even ascended to the rude confessional, which
was a mere excavation in the soft stone of the wall,--when we had put
our hands in the hollow, not unlike a swallow's nest in a mud-bank, once
the receptacle for holy water,--when we had descended the stony pathway,
for it was so worn as scarcely to merit the name of staircase,--when,
standing once more on the chapel-pavement, with minds excited by the
thought of those monkish days when priestcraft ruled the land,--our eyes
naturally fell on the old oak chest. What further revelation might not
this disclose! What sacred relics, what curious church-plate, what
vellum manuscript, might not be hidden beneath this heavy lid! Would she
rise and let us see?
No,--she maintained her seat and her reserve with as much rigidity as on
the former occasion. Unconvinced by this experience, our imaginations
still ran riot. They shadowed forth every possible beauty and horror
which such a giant chest might contain. The story even of "The Bride of
the Mistletoe-Bough" might be verified, if we could but get a peep. At
last we prevailed. The child was persuaded to dismount, we lifted the
cover, and the chest was empty,--literally empty.
Once more the plain fact of the present had swept away the cobwebs of
the past, the real had banished the ideal. While the child of to-day
sought only a comfortable rest from weariness, we had been seeking
myths. She looked on as indignant as a dethroned queen. We turned away a
little mortified, and a good deal disappointed.
But the Fenella of the castle was not so very tired, after all. True,
she was tired of the old manor-house, tired of us, tired of her own dull
routine of duty; but there was a well-spring of freshness in her yet.
She moved languidly, to be sure, as she now led the way to the tower,
the only portion of the castle yet unvisited. Following her, we
ascended, first, to a bare upper room, a sort of anteroom, from which
the ascent to the tower commenced. It presented a solid inclosure of
stone, except on the western side, where it was dimly lighted through
one or two slits in the masonry. Turning my eyes in this direction, I
saw our little guide leaning against the stone framework of one of these
chinks in the wall. The beams of western sunlight came slanting in at
precisely the angle of her figure as she leaned back in infantile
repose; her white ribbons, her snowy apron, her golden hair caught and
held the sunshine, and the ray of light which relieved the gloom of the
gray old vault seemed to emanate from the child.
One of our party addressed some question to her regarding the probable
design of the empty room in which we stood; but there was no
answer,--not even a responsive glance. Her eyes were fixed upon the
stone roof. She looked spell-bound. Before we could follow the direction
of her steady gaze, we were startled by the flapping of wings overhead,
and, still more, by the sudden rushing forward of the child with a loud
cry of "Shoo! shoo!" and with her hands stretched eagerly into the air.
Our presence had disturbed a swallow, which had found its way in through
one of the slits, and, perhaps, built a nest in some crevice of the
wall. The girl's languor was instantaneously dispelled by the discovery
and the excitement of pursuit. Here, now, was congenial sport. Hopeless
as was the attempt to catch the bird, the joy of frightening it was
sure; and our guide sprang wildly from side to side of the building,
uttering exciting exclamations, and making vain passes at the little
creature, which flew round high above her head, now and then settling in
some secure "coigne of vantage." In these intervals we endeavored to
catch the attention of the mischievous fowler, but her task had ended
with this tower-room, she had done with us, she had found an unexpected
source of sport, and was not to be deterred from an enjoyment which she
probably thought well-earned. With one eye following the least motion of
the bird, she informed us, at last, in reply to repeated inquiries, that
there was nothing to be told about the room we were in,--that it merely
led to the tower,--we could go up into the tower, if we wished.
She must go with us and show us the way.
"No," was the cool reply. She never went into the tower; she never went
any farther than this.
Glancing at the dilapidated state of the stairs leading to the
successive stones of the tower, we were almost tempted to believe that
her instinct of self-preservation had reached its climax here,--that we
might break our necks, if we liked,--she preferred not to run the risk.
Resolved to satisfy our suspicions, we pressed the point, and, after
many inquiries and waiting a considerable time upon the motions of the
child and her new plaything, we got the brief and somewhat scornful
explanation,--
"What if some other party should come while I was away?"
"We part here, then?"
She nodded in assent, received the fee for her services without
acknowledgment, and saw us depart on our breakneck expedition with an
indifference equalled only by the nonchalance with which she had
admitted us on our arrival. The moment our backs were turned, she
resumed her play.
After exploring the successive stories of the tower in safety, we
descended by way of the anteroom, but the bird and its pursuer had both
of them flown. We passed through a door she had previously pointed out,
and gained the garden as surreptitiously as did Dorothy Vernon, of old,
when, according to the tradition, she escaped through this same doorway
on the night of her sister's nuptials, and eloped with her lover, Mr.
(afterwards Sir John) Manners, who had long been haunting the
neighboring forest as an outlaw. We strolled through the ancient garden,
all ivied and moss-grown, admired the stone balustrade, which,
time-stained and mouldy, is still the student's favorite bit of
architecture, and at last made our way back to the farm-house,--I am
sure I do not remember how, for we were as deficient in a guide as on
our first attempt at entrance. Whether another party arrived while we
were in the tower, and were engrossing her attention,--whether she was
engaged in the more agreeable office of coquetting with the young
artist, or was still chasing the swallow from room to room of the
manor-house, I do not know. We saw her no more. She had barely
condescended to let us in, and now left us to find our way out as we
could.
She cared nothing at all for us. All the interest we had manifested in
her (and it was considerable) had failed to awaken any emotion. We were
a stereotyped feature of the old hall; and the old hall, though she had
sprung from its root, and her life had been nourished by its strength,
was no part of herself,--was her antipathy. Still I never think of the
mansion, with all the romantic associations which cluster around it, but
the image of this child comes to break my reverie, as she did on the day
when it was first indulged.
So we go to visit some royal oak, and bring away, as a memento, the
daisy which blooms at its foot; so we stand, as the reward of toil and
fatigue, upon an Alpine glacier, and the trophy and pledge of our visit
are the forget-me-not that grew on its margin. Thus youth and beauty
ever press on the footsteps of old age, and youth and beauty bear away
the palm.
My faith in legendary lore is confirmed, when I call to mind the Gothic
fortress, with its strong defences against the enemy, its rude
suggestions of centuries of hospitality, its tower-lattices, whence
generation after generation of high-born maids waved signals to knightly
lovers, its stairways, worn slippery with the tread of heavy-mailed
warriors, its chapel-vault, where chivalrous lord and noble dame have
turned to dust. But there is a faith more precious than the faith in old
song and legend; and the golden-haired child, who flourishes so fresh
and fair amidst all this ruin and decay, stands forth to my mind as an
emblem of that power which renovates earth and defies time. Had she been
a pattern child, had her instructors (whoever they were) succeeded in
moulding her into a mere machine, she might not so vividly have roused
my interest; but there was something in her saucy independence, her
wayward freaks, her coquettish airs, her fiery chase after the swallow,
which--breaking in, as they did, upon the docility with which she
otherwise went through her round of duty--revivified the desolation of
the old hall with a sudden outburst of humanity. Everywhere else the
fountain of life seemed to have died out, but here it gushed forth a
living stream.
We gaze down the centuries and see in them ignorance, error, warning,
and ruin at last. What hope for the race, then, if this were all? But it
is not all. The child's foot treading lightly over the graves is the
type of the _time-is_ triumphing over the _time-was_. Full of faults and
imperfections, she is still the daughter of Hope and Opportunity. She
has the past for her teacher, and the door of knowledge, repentance, and
faith stands open before her. Thus childhood is the rainbow of God's
providence, and the brightest feature of His covenant with men.
Silence, desolation, and decay have set their seal upon old Haddon Hall,
but chance has set a child over them all, and the lesson her simple
presence teaches is worth more to me than all the Idyls of the King.
And thus it is that I treasure up the memory of her among my catalogue
of guides; and so she did more for me than she promised, when she
undertook to lend me her light through the old Hall.
If there are any who can live without thus borrowing, then let them
disparage guides. For the rest, the best guide is Humility. We have all
so many dark paths to tread from the cradle to the grave, that we need
to lay hold on all the helps we can. Groping blindly down the avenues
of Time, who is there that does not long to grasp some friendly hand, or
follow in the track of some traveller familiar with the way?
For me, Experience is a staff on which I am glad to lean, Simplicity is
an unfailing leader where Learning might go astray. Trust is a lamp that
burns through the darkest night; and sometimes, when strong men are weak
and wise men foolish, strength and wisdom are given unto babes, and he
whom the counsels of the elders cannot save may walk the narrowest path
in safety with his hand in the hand of a little child.
God grant me guides, then, to my journey's end! God guide us all,
whether we will or no! guide the nations, and make for them a way
through the dust, the turmoil, and the strife which Time has heaped in
their path, to the freshness and promise of the new birth! guide each
poor yearning soul through the darkness and doubt that overshadow it, as
it journeys on to the clear light of immortal day!