Although the affections of Jane had sustained a blow, her pride had
received a greater, and no persuasions of her mother or sister could
induce her to leave her room. She talked little, but once or twice she
yielded to the affectionate attentions of Emily, and poured out her
sorrows into the bosom of her sister. At such moments she would declare
her intention of never appearing in the world again. One of these
paroxysms of sorrow was witnessed by her mother, and, for the first
time, self-reproach mingled in the grief of the matron. Had she trusted
less to appearances and to the opinions of indifferent and ill-judging
acquaintances, her daughter might have been apprized in season of the
character of the man who had stolen her affections. To a direct
exhibition of misery Lady Moseley was always sensible, and, for the
moment, she became alive to its causes and consequences; but a timely
and judicious safeguard against future moral evils was a forecast
neither her inactivity of mind nor abilities were equal to.
We shall leave Jane to brood over her lover's misconduct, while we
regret she is without the consolation alone able to bear her up against
the misfortunes of life, and return to the other personages of our
history.
The visit to Mrs. Fitzgerald had been postponed in consequence of Jane's
indisposition; but a week after the colonel's departure, Mrs. Wilson
thought, as Jane had consented to leave her room, and Emily really began
to look pale from her confinement by the side of a sick bed, she would
redeem the pledge she had given the recluse on the following morning.
They found the ladies at the cottage happy to see them, and anxious to
hear of the health of Jane, of whose illness they had been informed by
note. After offering her guests some refreshments, Mrs. Fitzgerald, who
appeared laboring under a greater melancholy than usual, proceeded to
make them acquainted with the incidents of her life.
The daughter of an English merchant at Lisbon had fled from the house of
her father to the protection of an Irish officer in the service of his
Catholic Majesty: they were united, and the colonel immediately took his
bride to Madrid. The offspring of this union were a son and daughter.
The former, at an early age, had entered into the service of his king,
and had, as usual, been bred in the faith of his ancestors; but the
Señora McCarthy had been educated, and yet remained a Protestant, and,
contrary to her faith to her husband, secretly instructed her daughter
in the same belief. At the age of seventeen, a principal grandee of the
court of Charles sought the hand of the general's child. The Conde
d'Alzada was a match not to be refused, and they were united in the
heartless and formal manner in which marriages are too often entered
into, in countries where the customs of society prevent an intercourse
between the sexes. The Conde never possessed the affections of his wife.
Of a stern and unyielding disposition, his harshness repelled her love;
and as she naturally turned her eyes to the home of her childhood, she
cherished all those peculiar sentiments she had imbibed from her mother.
Thus, although she appeared to the world a Catholic, she lived in secret
a Protestant. Her parents had always used the English language in their
family, and she spoke it as fluently as the Spanish. To encourage her
recollections of this strong feature, which distinguished the house of
her father from the others she entered, she perused closely and
constantly those books which the death of her mother placed at her
disposal. These were principally Protestant works on religious subjects,
and the countess became a strong sectarian, without becoming a
Christian. As she was compelled to use the same books in teaching her
only child, the Donna Julia, English, the consequences of the original
false step of her grandmother were perpetuated in the person of this
young lady. In learning English, she also learned to secede from the
faith of her father, and entailed upon herself a life of either
persecution or hypocrisy. The countess was guilty of the unpardonable
error of complaining to their child of the treatment she received from
her husband; and as these conversations were held in English, and were
consecrated by the tears of the mother, they made an indelible
impression on the youthful mind of Julia, who grew up with the
conviction that next to being a Catholic herself, the greatest evil of
life was to be the wife of one.
On her attaining her fifteenth year, she had the misfortune (if it could
be termed one) to lose her mother, and within the year her father
presented to her a nobleman of the vicinity as her future husband. How
long the religious faith of Julia would have endured, unsupported by
example in others, and assailed by the passions soliciting in behalf of
a young and handsome cavalier, it might be difficult to pronounce; but
as suitor was neither very young, and the reverse of very handsome, it
is certain the more he wooed, the more confirmed she became in her
heresy, until, in a moment of desperation, and as an only refuge against
his solicitations, she candidly avowed her creed. The anger of her
father was violent and lasting: she was doomed to a convent, as both a
penance for her sins and a means of reformation. Physical resistance was
not in her power, but mentally she determined never to yield. Her body
was immured, but her mind continued unshaken and rather more settled in
her belief, by the aid of those passions which had been excited by
injudicious harshness. For two years she continued in her novitiate,
obstinately refusing to take the vows of the order, and at the end of
that period the situation of her country had called her father and uncle
to the field as defenders of the rights of their lawful prince. Perhaps
to this it was owing that harsher measures were not adopted in her case.
The war now raged around them in its greatest horrors, until at length a
general battle was fought in the neighborhood, and the dormitories of
the peaceful nuns were crowded with wounded British officers. Amongst
others of his nation was a Major Fitzgerald, a young man of strikingly
handsome countenance and pleasant manners. Chance threw him under the
more immediate charge of Julia: his recovery was slow, and for a time
doubtful, and as much owing to good nursing as science. The major was
grateful, and Julia unhappy as she was beautiful. That love should be
the offspring of this association, will excite no surprise. A brigade of
British encamping in the vicinity of the convent, the young couple
sought its protection from Spanish vengeance and Romish cruelty. They
were married by the chaplain of the brigade, and for a month they were
happy.
As Napoleon was daily expected in person at the seat of war, his
generals were alive to their own interests, if not to that of their
master. The body of troops in which Fitzgerald had sought a refuge,
being an advanced party of the main army, were surprised and defeated
with loss. After doing his duty as a soldier at his post, the major, in
endeavoring to secure the retreat of Julia, was intercepted, and they
both fell into the hands of the enemy. They were kindly treated, and
allowed every indulgence their situation admitted, until a small escort
of prisoners was sent to the frontiers; in this they were included, and
had proceeded to the neighborhood of the Pyrenees, when, in their turn,
the French were assailed suddenly, and entirely routed; and the captive
Spaniards, of which the party, with the exception of our young couple,
consisted, released. As the French guard made a resistance until
overpowered by numbers, an unfortunate ball struck Major Fitzgerald to
the earth--he survived but an hour, and died where he fell, on the open
field. An English officer, the last of his retiring countrymen, was
attracted by the sight of a woman weeping over the body of a fallen man,
and approached them. In a few words Fitzgerald explained his situation
to this gentleman, and exacted a pledge from him to guard his Julia, in
safety, to his mother in England.
The stranger promised everything the dying husband required, and by the
time death had closed the eyes of Fitzgerald, he had procured from some
peasants a rude conveyance, into which the body, with its almost equally
lifeless widow, were placed. The party which intercepted the convoy of
prisoners, had been out from the British camp on other duty, but its
commander hearing of the escort, had pushed rapidly into a country
covered by the enemy to effect their rescue; and his service done, he
was compelled to make a hasty retreat to ensure his own security. To
this was owing the indifference, which left the major to the care of the
Spanish peasantry who had gathered to the spot, and the retreating
troops had got several miles on their return, before the widow and her
protector commenced their journey. It was impossible to overtake them,
and the inhabitants acquainting the gentleman that a body of French
dragoons were already harassing their rear, he was compelled to seek
another route to the camp. This, with some trouble and no little danger,
he at last effected; and the day following the skirmish, Julia found
herself lodged in a retired Spanish dwelling, several miles within the
advanced posts of the British army. The body of her husband was
respectfully interred, and Julia was left to mourn her irretrievable
loss, uninterrupted by anything but by the hasty visits of the officer
in whose care she had been left--visits which he stole from his more
important duties as a soldier.
A month glided by in this melancholy manner, leaving to Mrs. Fitzgerald
the only consolation she would receive--her incessant visits to the
grave of her husband. The calls of her protector, however, became more
frequent; and at length he announced his intended departure for Lisbon,
on his way to England. A small covered vehicle, drawn by one horse, was
to convey them to the city, at which place he promised to procure her a
female attendant, and necessaries for the voyage home. It was no time or
place for delicate punctilio; and Julia quietly, but with a heart nearly
broken, prepared to submit to the wishes of her late husband. After
leaving the dwelling, the manners of her guide sensibly altered; he
became complimentary and assiduous to please, but in a way rather to
offend than conciliate; until his attentions became so irksome, that
Julia actually meditated stopping at some of the villages through which
they passed, and abandoning the attempt of visiting England entirely.
But the desire to comply with Fitzgerald's wish, that she would console
his mother for the loss of an only child, and the dread of the anger of
her relatives, determined her to persevere until they reached Lisbon,
where she was resolved to separate for ever from the disagreeable and
unknown guardian into whose keeping she had been thrown by chance.
The last day of their weary ride, while passing a wood, the officer so
far forgot his own character and Julia's misfortunes, as to offer
personal indignities. Grown desperate from her situation, Mrs.
Fitzgerald sprang from the vehicle, and by her cries attracted the
notice of an officer who was riding express on the same road with
themselves. He advanced to her assistance at speed, but as he arrived
near them, a pistol fired from the carriage brought his horse down, and
the treacherous friend was enabled to escape undetected. Julia
endeavored to explain her situation to her rescuer; and by her distress
and appearance, satisfied him at once of its truth. Within a short time,
a strong escort of light dragoons came up, and the officer despatched
some for a conveyance, and others in pursuit of that disgrace to the
army, the villanous guide: the former was soon obtained, but no tidings
could be had of the latter. The carriage was found at a short distance,
without the horse and with the baggage of Julia, but with no vestige of
its owner. She never knew his name, and either accident or art had so
completely enveloped him in mystery, that all efforts to unfold it then
were fruitless, and had continued so ever since.
On their arrival in Lisbon, every attention was shown to the
disconsolate widow the most refined delicacy could dictate, and every
comfort and respect were procured for her which the princely fortune,
high rank, and higher character of the Earl of Pendennyss, could
command. It was this nobleman, who, on his way from head-quarters with
despatches for England, had been the means of preserving Julia from a
fate worse than death. A packet was in waiting for the earl, and they
proceeded in her for home. The Donna Lorenza was the widow of a
subaltern Spanish officer, who had fallen under the orders and near
Pendennyss, and the interest he took in her brave husband had induced
him to offer her, in the destruction of her little fortune by the enemy,
his protection: for near two years he had maintained her at Lisbon and
now, judging her a proper person, had persuaded her to accompany Mrs.
Fitzgerald to England.
On the passage, which was very tedious, the earl became more intimately
acquainted with the history and character of his young friend, and by a
course of gentle yet powerful expedients had drawn her mind gradually
from its gloomy contemplation of futurity, to a juster sense of good and
evil. The peculiarity of her religious persuasion afforded an
introduction to frequent discussions of the real opinions of that
church, to which Julia had hitherto belonged, although ignorant of all
its essential and vital truths. These conversations, which were renewed
repeatedly in their intercourse while under the protection of his sister
in London, laid the foundations of a faith which left her nothing to
hope for but the happy termination of her earthly probation.
The mother of Fitzgerald was dead, and as he had no near relative left,
Julia found herself alone in the world. Her husband had taken the
precaution to make a will in season it was properly authenticated, and
his widow, by the powerful assistance of Pendennyss, was put in quiet
possession of a little independency. It was while waiting the decision
of this affair that Mrs. Fitzgerald resided for a short time near Bath.
As soon as it was terminated, the earl and his sister had seen her
settled in her present abode, and once since had they visited her; but
delicacy had kept him away from the cottage, although his attempts to
serve her had been constant, though not always successful. He had, on
his return to Spain, seen her father, and interceded with him on her
behalf, but in vain. The anger of the Spaniard remained unappeased, and
for a season he did not renew his efforts; out having heard that her
father was indisposed, Julia had employed the earl once more to make her
peace with him, without prevailing. The letter the ladies had found her
weeping over was from Pendennyss, informing her of his want of success
on that occasion.
The substance of the foregoing narrative was related by Mrs. Fitzgerald
to Mrs. Wilson, who repeated it to Emily in their ride home. The
compassion of both ladies was strongly moved in behalf of the young
widow; yet Mrs. Wilson did not fail to point out to her niece the
consequences of deception, and chiefly the misery which had followed
from an abandonment of some of the primary duties of life--obedience and
respect to her parent. Emily, though keenly alive to all the principles
inculcated by her aunt, found so much to be pitied in the fate of her
friend, that her failings lost their proper appearance in her eyes, and
for a while she could think of nothing but Julia and her misfortunes.
Previously to their leaving the cottage, Mrs. Fitzgerald, with glowing
cheeks and some hesitation, informed Mrs. Wilson she had yet another
important communication to make, but would postpone it until her next
visit, which Mrs. Wilson promised should be on the succeeding day.