Alas! the maiden sighed since first
I said: 'Oh, fountain, read my doom.'
What vainest fancies have I nursed,
Of which I am myself the tomb!
L. E. L.
It was a beautiful evening of that next summer year, and a large
family-party was assembled at Glan Pennant, now again inhabited by its
rightful owner, Arthur Seaham: the handsome dowry of his lovely bride,
Carrie Elliott, joined to the emolument derived from the rapid and
promising rise in his profession, having enabled him to take possession
of his much loved home on his marriage, about a twelve month since.
Not only were Alice Gillespie and her family the guests of the young
couple; but Lady Everingham, their eldest sister, who had returned from
India, and the beautiful Selina, whose husband was shortly to follow,
was staying with their children at Plas-Glyn, with the Morgans; and no
evening passed without, as may be supposed, some reunion of this sort
taking place at one or the other of the neighbouring residences. But
there was one still wanting, on this present occasion, without whom such
gatherings could not be complete--one, regarded with a kind of peculiar
love by each there present, though by none, perhaps, with such especial
tenderness as by the young master and mistress of Glan Pennant; and ever
and anon the question as to when Mary would return, and what could have
kept her out so late, was heard repeated: the children of the party
going back to Plas-Glyn, sorrowful at not having been able to wish that
dear Aunt Mary good night.
Some one, at length, remarked that Mr. Wynne had not been seen for the
last day or two. Arthur Seaham observed, in reply, that he had been
expecting a visitor, with whom he had been probably occupied; and he and
Carrie exchanged looks of some significance.
Mary was not a partner in their secret understanding. Calmly, as was
her wont, she had been returning homeward, with the happy consciousness
that her presence that day had lighted up many a face with
sunshine--bound up by its consolation, many a wounded heart--that she
could lay her head on her pillow that night, and feel that she had
to-day lived to God, and to her fellow-creatures.
And truly many a tongue blessed, and many an eye turned with love and
respect, as they looked upon that sweet pale face, returning slowly from
her wanderings amongst them. Mary knew she was expected home to tea, but
having turned a wistful eye towards her favourite hill, now all red and
glowing in the early sunset, finally began the ascent; and once more we
see her seated on that cool, quiet spot, her eye fixed on the same fair
scene she had viewed with such fond, but hopeful regret, on the evening
of her last departure from her mountain-home. And, oh! it was on such
occasions, when hours of languid ease returned like this she now
enjoyed, that Mary felt the urgent necessity of bracing up her mind and
nerves by a course of healthy action, by carrying out into practice the
lesson which the great trial of her early youth had taught
her--"Patience, abnegation of self, and devotion to others." For then
would she feel stealing over her senses the spirit of those days, when
she had walked the earth overshadowed by a dream. Yes, the spirit of her
dream had changed since last we followed Mary Seaham to this charmed
spot!--the shadows of hopes at that time vaguely cherished in her
breast, soon, to her sorrow, so wonderfully realized, had passed away
for ever, as their idol object had been torn from its shrine.
And now this purer, nobler image, reared upon the crumbled image of the
former, engendered by no ideal dreams--no morbid fantasy, but which, by
the force of its own glorious strength and beauty, had won its victory
over her soul--must this be also doomed to perish--to fade away into a
haunting shadow of the past?
Yes, Eustace Trevor must be to her as one dead--not absent!--the dream
be dissipated, for the hope was vain on which it was founded: vain--and
incompatible with the pure, calm hope it was now the desire of her heart
to aspire.
Not very long, therefore, did Mary allow herself to indulge in the
beguiling luxury of her solitary repose; but remembering that there were
loving hearts at home awaiting her return, she aroused herself from the
spirit of reverie which was stealing over her, and waiting but to pluck
some few sprigs of the first white heath of the season, with one last,
lingering look on the fading beauties of the landscape, she rose and
turned to depart; but as if arrested by fear or a feeling of wonder,
"Still she stood with her lips apart,
And forgotten, the flowerets dropped from her fingers,
Whilst to her eyes and her cheeks, came the light and
The bloom of the morning."
For it was no dream--no deluding vision of her imagination out of which
she was called to awake--a shadow indeed was upon her path, but it was
the form of Eustace Trevor, which in its noble reality stood before her!
* * * * *
The conversation which ensued was not so lengthened as that which had
taken place between Edward Temple and Mary Seaham, on that same spot
some six years ago; but need we say that its issue was of a very
different character, and that this time Eustace did not descend the
hill alone.
Mr. Wynne was waiting at the gate of Glan Pennant, when at length the
stately figure of his friend, and leaning on his arm the fair and
fragile form of Mary,
"The dew on the plaid, and the tear in her e'e,"
appeared in sight.
Hastening to meet them, he wrung the hand of Mary with emotion, but bade
her go in fast and make the tea which had been waiting for her ever so
long--the water getting cold whilst she was after her old tricks,
dreaming on the hills; and Mary, with a grateful smile, having returned
the fervent pressure of her good old friend, in broken accents, promised
that she would dream no more.
She was not indeed free from a deep debt of gratitude to Mr. Wynne, for
it was he who, it may be said, had formed the cementing link between the
fates of Mary Seaham and Eustace Trevor.
Not that any such was wanting to maintain the strongly rooted attachment
of Eustace towards Mary. It was one which must ever have exerted a
sensible and indelible influence over his future life, as it had done
over the few last years of his past existence. But there were scruples
in his mind, the result perhaps of that extreme susceptibility
conspicuous in his character, on every point of delicacy or honour,
which restrained him from yielding himself to the delightful hope of
obtaining the beloved of his brother for his wife; and it was these
morbid scruples, as he deemed them, that Mr. Wynne had made every effort
to overcome, and that not so much by direct argument, as by bringing
before his friend's imagination the lovely picture of Mary's present
existence, finally declaring that, through the daily increasing
heavenliness of her life and conversation, she was growing so much too
good for this world, that they should not be allowed to retain her long
amongst them, did not some earthly tie of a very binding nature give her
some motive for interest here below; and there was one alone he felt
convinced could have that power--for that some secret grief, some sorrow
unspoken, unsuspected--some strongly crushed affection, lay at the
bottom of Mary Seaham's outwardly calm and patient demeanour, and this
in no way connected with the old delusion of her youth, her old friend
felt but too well assured.
So on this hint it was that Eustace Trevor came--came with a heart all
yearning, tremulous tenderness and solicitude--and once more on the
Welsh hill-side, laid the hope and happiness of his future life at the
feet of Mary Seaham.
* * * * *
And the world--that part of it at least which had known of the
engagement subsisting between Mary and Eugene Trevor--might remark on
the singular and interesting circumstance of her union with the elder
brother; but as the general understanding had been, that through
Eugene's own fault his engagement had been dissolved, and his change of
position considerably altering that same charitable world's estimation
of the younger brother's character, there were few inclined to make any
invidious comment on the new arrangement, nor deem it anything but
one--most wise, fortunate, and just.
There was, however, amongst Mary's friends, one who seemed inclined at
first to frown on the affair--Mrs. de Burgh was loth to the last to let
fall the weapons of defence she had always wielded in behalf of her old
favourite, and maintained, that if there was a law against a marriage
with two brothers, she considered consecutive attachment to each equally
to be repudiated. But as she could not well carry out the argument which
her husband so triumphantly derided, she in the end let the subject
drop; and finally, with as much kindly warmth as she had bestowed upon
the beloved of Eugene, received beneath her roof the bride of Eustace
Trevor.
* * * * *
As we are upon the subject, we might as well regretfully state, that
Silverton has never yet become quite the perfect seat of conjugal
felicity we would fain have left it, but that petty bickerings and
debates still occasionally desecrate its inner walls.
Still we hope that, though there are no very conspicuous symptoms of
reform, the evil is somewhat on the decrease; that the fair Olivia, as
she grows older, steadies down in a degree her high-wrought expectations
and ideas; and her husband, in proportion, softens away his asperity and
selfish disregard, allowing his natural amiability of disposition to
have its own way towards his wife, as well as to the rest of the world.
Whilst, at the same time, was there not a mansion in the neighbourhood
where a perfect pattern of unity and godly love was exhibited, such as
put to shame every spirit of domestic strife which approached it?
In fact, the prosperity of the de Burghs continues so unabated, so
little else do they find in life to ruffle the even tenor of their lot,
that if they do still indulge in a few domestic quarrels, it would seem
to be, that, preserved from every other exciting cause of trouble and
annoyance, it must be on the principle adopted by two little sisters of
our acquaintance, who, on being reproved for their continual squabbles
with one another, begged that they might not be deprived of this
privilege, saying that it would take from them their greatest amusement;
in short, be so very dull, if they were not allowed to quarrel.
The Eustace Trevors first went abroad: there they revisited those scenes
they had last viewed together under such different auspices, but which
had been the period from which Mary dated the current of her fate to
have been turned--a purer, nobler image to have risen on the ruins of
the old; and Eustace Trevor--blessed beyond conception, finds himself in
the enjoyment of that most ambitioned privilege, the guide and guardian
of his Mary, beneath skies which seemed to grow still "fairer for her
sake."
In about a year's time, they returned to England, where the new mansion
awaited their reception. The mansion had been rebuilt much on the same
plan as the other, only the position and arrangement of the library was
entirely altered. One room, as far as it were possible, had been
remodelled by Eustace after the fashion of the original--that one in
which at once his happiest and his most agonizing hours in that old home
might be said to have been spent.
Mary did not tell her husband, as they sat together in the sunny window
of that apartment, the very afternoon of their arrival, what
associations were in her mind connected with that place.
Eustace Trevor had had no personal communication with his brother since
they parted at Silverton. It is easier for the offended to forgive than
the offender to be forgiven, and no true reconcilement could ever heal
the wounds, which his injured brother's generous conduct had impressed
on Eugene's galled conscience. Besides, what sympathy could exist
between two natures so different? what intercourse be established
between two individuals whose course of conduct and habits of life were
so widely apart?
What were Eugene Trevor's feelings when he heard of Mary Seaham's
marriage with his brother, we cannot exactly define; but that it placed
only a more decisive barrier between their personal intercourse, may be
imagined. He lived on his handsome younger brother's income of two
thousand a-year, in London; his brother having paid all his debts, and
thus added to his legitimate claim of ten thousand pounds to which alone
he was entitled.
The brothers met occasionally in London; but Eugene never accepted any
invitation to visit Montrevor, nor was he scarcely heard of amongst his
former country friends. Even Silverton was deserted by him.
Some say that the avaricious parsimony of his father is growing rapidly
upon him, and this and many other similarities of character and conduct
which year after year develop themselves, may well cause Mary gratefully
to rejoice that she was suffered before too late to redeem the error of
_her first mistaken choice_.
THE END.
LONDON:
Printed by Schulze and Co., 13, Poland Street.
[Transcriber's Note: Hyphen and spelling variations within each volume
and between volumes left as printed.]