Leighton's discourse, and certainly never heard any language more
entirely free than is his from that _twang_ which I have hitherto
considered as a characteristic of the ultras in religion." "Now, my
young friend," replied Domine, "are you not falling yourself into
the error which you reprobate? Why use those words, which designate
a sect of fashionable fault-finders, who rail against a religion
which they do not take the trouble to investigate, just as plainly
as the terms that you are desirous to abolish, mark what you call
the new light fraternity?"
I told him that I stood corrected, and he shook my hand, saying, "I
thank you for so kindly excusing me in thus abruptly calling you
to order;" and then continued--"Mr. Leighton is a person of such
character, that my conclusion respecting his not being a Calvinist
was drawn entirely from the absence of those expressions generally
belonging to the school." "But, sir," said Mr. Bentley, "I have
heard several sermons preached by men whose principles I discovered
at a _short turn_ now and then to be really Calvinistic, though
they were free from every peculiarity of phrase, and so guarded
as to doctrine, that for a long time I have resisted the idea of
their being any other than evangelical ministers of the gospel,
such as you described it to be." "Aye," answered Oliphant, "that
is the very point to which I would draw your attention. It is, in
my opinion, not right to consider any tenet of a particular creed
essential to salvation, and yet _suppress_ it. Either the _decretum
horribile_ is, or is not, a vital article: If not, there is no
Calvinism, and if it be, no man who believes in its importance
as a pillar of faith is justified by motives of _expediency_ in
leaving out subjects so essential in _their_ view of the Christian
system. A practical evil which I have known to proceed from what is
commonly called a _judicious_ style of preaching is, that many are
taken in to become members of a congregation before they are aware
of the tenets of their instructor. Much confusion of mind sometimes
results. Weak understandings are perplexed, and the effect is,
that people who are not capable of drawing nice distinctions, at
last slide gradually, without any exercise of their own will or
understanding, into the opinions very different from those of
which they _imagine_ themselves to be the advocates. But, my dear
Mr. Howard, we should each in his own sphere, be it narrow or
extended, rejoice in all the good that exists, though it may vary
in its livery; and, so far from cultivating a spirit of ridicule,
endeavour to draw the bonds of charity together, so as to include
all the _sincere_ and pains-taking of the Christian community,
within its ample scope."
We were now arrived at the house, and separated into little
parties. My aunt and her daughters disappeared, Mr. Oliphant and
young Bentley went off to the school, and Fred. and I took a
long and delightful walk _tête-à-tête_ by the sea side. We had a
great deal of conversation that informed me of many particulars
respecting my family, with which I had never till then been made
acquainted. On returning home, as we passed a cabin door, I saw
Fanny busily distributing bread and money, the former from a large
basket held by the same boy who attends the donkies, and the
latter from a small leather bag which she carried slung upon her
arm. "What are you doing here?" was answered by "nothing but our
Sunday-work;" which, being interpreted, meant a weekly donation
presented by these amiable girls to a few old people who cannot
work, and who esteem the gift tenfold for being communicated by
the hands of their young mistresses. This is a _striking_ feature
in the poor of this island. In England, a shilling is a shilling
provided it come legitimately from the mint, no matter who is the
donor; but here sentiment, which with us is confined to the higher
classes, is to be found in the most miserable habitations.
Charlotte, who was within the hut, joined our party, and told us
that a poor man had just been expressing to her feelings which
certainly are not common in any rank of life. She had said,
"_Tim._, why are you not walking to-day; it is too fine weather
to stay in the house?" and his answer was, "The finer the day, my
dear miss, the more I'd covet not to be looking at it; ever since
I buried _her_, I'd rather be to myself, and Sunday brings all the
people out." What an artless expression of faithful affection! This
man's wife, who is the "_her_" to be comprehended, he supposes, by
every one, because there is no other to confound with the image in
his own breast, has been dead for six years; and yet Memory is true
to her trust. There is something very endearing in this tenderness,
and we feel in good humour with our species, when an instance
like what I have mentioned occurs, to prove that some of our best
movements can spring from an uncultivated soil.
At dinner, after dinner, and all the evening, I am compelled in
honesty to say, that not a moment passed heavily. We laughed and
talked as usual. The interval between dinner and tea was spent in
walking; that between tea and nine o'clock in listening to some of
Handel's finest songs, very sweetly performed; and e'er "the close
of the silent eve," the family group were once more assembled; and
after prayers, and a short but impressive sermon, sent to their
rest with an emphatic blessing.
You have now the panorama of Glenalta, and you are placed upon
a platform in the midst, from which, turning yourself round the
scene, you can form a just idea of every object which it includes
within the circuit.
Thus have I brought (I believe with fidelity) the first part of my
epistolary labours to a conclusion. From this time forth you will
know all the _ground-plan_, and be enabled to allot its own place
to each occurrence as it may chance to arise. As to the general
impression made upon my mind, I own to you that I never was so
happy anywhere as since I came to this lone and lovely spot; and
I am powerfully struck with the truth of a remark which you once
made to me, and which at that time though I had a vague idea of
your being right, I had no actual experience that permitted me to
confirm; namely, that _society_ in its true sense consists not in
the number of those _persons_ with whom one converses, but in the
number of ideas excited in one's own mind. Glenalta completely
illustrates this observation. A family of five individuals, with
the addition of two intimate friends, have furnished such variety
and excitement in the flow of my thoughts, that I appear to have
lived in a crowd; and through a long duration of time I was
thinking of this circumstance before I got up this morning as a
contradiction to the common notion, that when we are most happy
time seems the fleetest; but I see how it is--both remarks are
strictly true.
Stimulus of an agreeable diversified nature certainly prevents our
taking note of time while _present_, and therefore it may be said
to glide away rapidly; but when _remembered_, every circumstance
which produced a change of pleasure, serves to distinguish one
portion from another, and thus to afford a sense of progress,
which the dullness of monotony is incapable of producing, just as
a single acre of ground, animated by trees, houses, and living
creatures, fills a much greater extent in imagination, when we
_recollect_ the landscape, than is occupied by a wide expanse of
ocean, though the latter, when _looked_ upon, appeared a boundless
prospect; _still_, however, in the midst of this sunshine of the
heart, I always bear in mind that its _locality_ is the secret of
its charm. _You_ would not agree with me, but I am assured that the
sort of thing that delights where one feels no _responsibility_,
would cease to fascinate in the moment that the surrounding world
came to call one to account for one's country cousins: and these
dear souls, perhaps, might make one blush at the _west end_. I
ought not to say so from any thing that I have seen here; but
the whole course of our thoughts and feelings is _so_ subject to
join the tide of opinion, that I hardly dare to assert how far my
present impressions, vivid as they are, would stand the test of a
Bond-street jury.
As Mrs. Malaprop says, however, "let us not have any retrospections
as to the future" _Viva, viva_. I am so much better, that I hardly
remember how I came here in the high road to Charon's ferry.
I am longing to hear from you. Don't forget to let me know about
Stanhope, as Mr. Otway will be anxious to learn whether you and he
_cement_.
Adieu, dear Falkland. Am I not the very pine-apple, and
quintessence of letter-writers? Huzza!
Yours, ever affectionately,
ARTHUR HOWARD.
LETTER VIII.
MISS DOUGLAS TO MISS SANDFORD.
My dearest Julia, _Glenalta_.
Unfortunately for me, I promised to write again without entering
into any covenant with you; and were I prevented from performing
my vow for half a year to come, I suppose that you would be a
little female Shylock and insist upon your bond, before you put
pen to paper. I do not know whether I shall do more wisely in
refraining from all apology for my silence, or in attempting to
account for it. If you have been able to settle into a regular
track of daily employment since your return to Checkley, you will
be able to comprehend how the day should often find us defaulters
at its close, in at least half the amount of what we had to do
at its commencement; but if the _whirl_ of travelling be still
in operation, you may wonder how people, who are stationary,
should not have too much time, rather than too little, on hand. I
will therefore keep on the safe side, and make no excuse, lest it
should not be considered a valid one, till I know how far you can
understand our habits of life; but as I am very certain of your
heart, I will proceed to tell you, as I promised in my last letter,
of the surprise which Frederick and I have prepared lately for our
dearest mother.
On Wednesday next Arthur is to take a long ride with Mr. George
Bentley, and Frederick, and I mean to take advantage of our
cousin's absence to introduce mamma to the _retreat_, for so we
have named the spot which is consecrated by our rural labours to
this idol of our daily worship. Surely such worship cannot be
idolatry, for through the finest mortal, as the most beautiful
natural, object, we may pay homage to the God that created it. But
_do_ we really offer this tribute, or does not too much love--does
not too large a share of adoration rest in the channel without
reaching the source, like the worship of our poor Roman Catholic,
which is certainly given to the pictures and images, that adorn
their altars rather than to the Divinity which they represent?
This is a question which my conscience so often asks itself, that
I believe the true answer would come against me; and yet with
the half convicted sense of being a sinner, the sin of loving my
mother beyond due bounds, borrows so much of her character from its
object, that it _appears_ like virtue, and so deludes.
Fred. and I talked the matter over yesterday evening, as we stole
away to our hallowed bower.
When you were at Glenalta, I never told you of the discovery which
my brother and I had made, because to have mentioned, without
shewing you, a gem so worthy of your admiration, as I shall
presently describe, would hardly have been kind. Your curiosity
and feeling would have been awakened, and I should have feared to
gratify them lest we might have disturbed the solitary genius of
the place, who was at that time, a daily visitant at its rustic
shrine. When first we came here, as I told you in my last letter,
Nanny and Mr. Oliphant were alternately our walking companions.
Mamma was weak both in body and spirits; and though she made
exertion to be gay when we were with her, it is only long since
that period that I have been fully sensible how much we owed her
for efforts that were beyond her strength. As the mind requires to
unbend after intense meditation, so her spirit asked repose after
over excitement, and she used to glide along the shrubbery, meet
her donkey at its wicket gate, and, following the winding pathway
of our glen, ascend, as we imagined the mountain that lies beyond
St. Colman's rock, to breathe the "unchartered air of heaven," in
full security of not being interrupted; but, as she never went
accompanied by any one, we still only conjectured whither she
directed her daily ride: and her sorrow was too sensitive, even to
our young eyes, to permit of our asking many questions. We had been
at Glenalta for three years, before Frederick and I, who were then
allowed to visit our poor people at a distance, and explore our
glens alone, found ourselves one day about three miles from home,
and along the course of the same rivulet which sports so gracefully
near our moss-house, at the most enchanting spot that I ever
beheld. It is a tiny dell, shut out, or rather shut in, from all
the world besides. A Liliputian lawn of the softest green, and not
more than a few yards in circumference, serves as a pedestal to one
single tree, the only one of its kind in the whole scene. This tree
is a beach of surpassing beauty, which casts its delicate branches
in a sweeping curve round the little area which it occupies,
forming an umbrella of shade, except in one part, where a natural
opening invites underneath its lovely archway.
The stream, which near Glenalta is comparatively tame, though
sweetly fanciful, assumes a bolder aspect at the retreat, and
dashes over fragments of broken rock, which are richly clothed with
fern and ivy, and start from masses of holly, and other brushwood,
that grow luxuriantly down at each side, to the verge of our
mountain brook, which makes a circuit round the beech, so as to
render the _velvet cushion_ on which it stands almost a little
island. As the bleak heath-covered hill rises in every direction,
you could fancy yourself to have reached a fertile oasis in the
midst of a desert. Nothing of animated life appeared in view
except two young goats that had ventured down the precipice, and
the silence was only broken by the rush of waters. Frederick and I
stood quite transfixed; but when our first exclamations of wonder
and delight had subsided, we determined on exploring farther, and
passing round the tree we scrambled to the other side, and found a
rude seat of stone, over which a tuft of alders and mountain-ash
had formed a roof impenetrable to the sun. A variety of the
beautiful orchis, cowslip, and primrose tribes intermixed with wild
violets of the most brillant purple, enameled the ground, and the
softest moss lined every part of this sylvan niche with refreshing
verdure. We sat down in a perfect ecstacy, then pulled bundles of
flowers, drank at the stream, and were indulging in all the luxury
of our good fortune, when something white struck my eye, clung
into the root of an old hazle which stood a little below us. I
pointed it out to Frederick, who immediately jumped down the rock,
and found a bit of paper rolled round a pencil. It was torn, and
had been injured by wet, having evidently lain for a long time in
its concealment. The holly which grows so abundantly all over the
rocks, had furnished its evergreen protection so as to save the
paper from melting away, and the weight of the pencil, round which
it was tightly wrapped, had contributed with the tangled roots, to
prevent its being carried away by the wind. We eagerly unfolded
our mysterious prize, and with some difficulty decyphered, at last
completely, and in mamma's hand-writing, the following lines:
Inscribed upon thy polished rind,
That name was once engraved,
Which, traced upon my heart I find,
The wreck that grief has saved.
Nor ruthless time, nor cankering care,
Hath swept that sacred line;
The perfect record lingers there,
Carved on the faithful shrine.
Yes, and within thy beechen breast,
Sweet sympathy conceals
The characters that once confessed,
Thy bark no more reveals.
Thy glossy fane now furrowed o'er,
Protects from wandering gaze
That name adored, which never more
Thy jealous love betrays.
Thy roughened form,--my time-worn cheek,
Alike refuse to tell
The signs that idlers vainly seek
Within this leafy dell.
But when the axe hath laid thee low,
And bowed thy graceful head;
And _me_, life's latest mortal foe,
Shall number with the dead;
Then in our bosoms' inmost seat,
The self same image found,
Reveals to view its deep retreat,
Fast in the heart-strings bound.
We gazed on each other, and the truth flashed upon our hearts in
the same instant. Frederick and I, by a movement imparted from
within, darted towards the tree together, and on examination
found a part of the once varnished surface, raised into irregular
carbuncles, where the bark had closed with time over some letters
no longer legible. With much pains, we satisfied ourselves that the
initials H. A. C. D. had been interwoven, and cut in the bark from
the external face of which, these letters had been carried inward
by the process of annual growth. It immediately occurred to us,
that our beloved parents had made this a favourite haunt in happier
days; and that the undying memory of some faithful mourner had
sought again these now almost obliterated characters. Such mourner
could have been no other than the dear surviving guardian of our
youth; and our tears flowed without restraint, as we read again and
again, the stanzas of which we had become accidentally possessed.
The first movement of our minds was, as you may suppose, to restore
them directly to their author; and it was not without considerable
reasoning between ourselves, that either could convince the other
of its being better to suppress the verses, and say nothing of the
_retreat_. From mamma's never having communicated any hint relative
to this little hermit-cell, it was obvious that she did not wish
us to discover its situation; then, the pencilled lines had been
lost for some time. She had made no inquiry about them; her memory
was able in all probability, to supply them again; and in giving
up what manifestly appeared to be mamma's own composition, such
explanation might have ensued as would have opened all her wounds
afresh, and destroyed ever afterwards the pleasure which she
appeared to feel in visiting the sequestered spot which we had
discovered. Upon mature deliberation then we agreed to hush up our
little adventure, and keep the tender effusion that we had found,
till some natural opportunity might occur of giving it back again
to its owner.
Time has rolled on, and the gradual influence of its healing power
is happily illustrated in the improved condition of our precious
_charge_, (for I consider her as a blessing conferred upon her
children, henceforward placed peculiarly in their care); and a
moment having arrived in which Frederick agreed with me that we
might venture to commence our little scheme, we set to work in
the beginning of November, just at the time when the change of
weather, and the death of faithful Dapple, that sole companion of
our _pilgrim's progress_, conspired to prevent the discovery of
our plan. Poor Tom Collins and his son, who live not far from the
scene of our operations, were necessarily let into the secret, for
they were manual contributors to the execution of our project; and
had this _not_ been the case, I should have still rewarded the
former by a confidence, the _distinguishing_ nature of which he
knows how to appreciate, in return for a trait of feeling so unlike
one's abstract notion of a _peasant_, and so delicate, that I must
tell the anecdote of him, before I proceed with our works at the
retreat. One day preparatory to our design, Frederick and I watched
an opportunity when mamma was obliged to drive on business to a
little town in our neighbourhood, and paid a visit to our favourite
spot. We were sitting talking over past, present, and future,
when a slight rustling amongst the leaves, announced the approach
of some one; and presently poor Tom Collins, on tip-toe, and his
finger, in sign of caution, placed upon his lip, stood before us.
"Och, then," said he, "its I that am after running to stop your
honours from coming down at all, at all, into my misthess's nook.
I does be keeping the childer always from this place till the sun
does be setting, and then I knows there 'ont be any danger in life
of seeing her honour, for becaase she only comes of a morning."
"And Tom," answered I, "why are you so uneasy from the fear of
seeing mamma?"
"Och, then, miss, my heart, I'll tell ye, and I never tould it
afore, nor wouldn't now, only becaase I never seed any one of
quality like, here, only her honour's self; and now if I don't
tell, why may be she'd be fretted to think that you and Masther
Fred. would find her out in her nook; and I knows very well, that
she wouldn't like it, for when it plased God to take my poor boy
Darby away from me, I'd covet to be all day moping if I could, down
in that very bottom. Why, then, sure enough, it was there I was one
Midsummer day, lying down flat on the ground beyont the big holly
stump, and thinking heavy enough of Darby, becaase of all days in
the year, 'twas his own birth day, when I heard a whispering like,
under the baach-tree, so I gets up fair and softly, without making
as much stir as a baatle among the laaves; why then _mavourneen_,
what would I see but my misthess on her two knees, upon the could
ground, looking up and praying like. Well, there I stood, and I
seed her crying like droppings from the ivy beyant; and I heerd the
words axing the Lord to make yees good childer, and mark yees to
Glory. And then she'd ax Him to make her a good mother, and to keep
and to help her all the days of her life; and sure, be the same
token, God listened to her prayer, for she's the best of ladies.
After that she'd get up, and talk to the tree all as one as if it
was a Christian, about my maasther, for I heerd her say, _Hinnery_,
and so I knew well enough who she'd be spaiking of, being that I'd
be often that way talking myself to the air, as I may say, about
Darby. Well, my heart grew so big, that I thought it would fairly
jump out o'me; so with that, I slinged away; and seeing poor Dapple
another day fastened behind the rock above, I says to myself, to be
sure says I, she's moping there like myself, and so I never would
come again till night fall; but when I have time, I does be above,
not far off, only she can't see me, be raison I'd like, if any
thing would be for going down the clift, to stop 'em till she'd be
clear and clane out o' the place for the day. So that's all about
it; and she don't be coming so often now, tho' in the main-time
'tis constant at her prayers or writing on a bit of a paper, or
reading out of a little book that she does be, whenever she'll come
to the lag below."
The eloquence of Demosthenes could not have worked upon our hearts
like this simple story. I seized instinctively upon the rough hand
of honest Tom, and Frederick did so likewise. We were too full to
utter a word, but we each of us resolved that this trait should
have its recording angel, and that, however tears might bedew
the remembrance of it, they should never blot out the registry.
Of this we _said_ nothing, for it would have been a species of
sacrilege to sully the purity of such genuine feeling, by making
it an apparent cause of any temporal benefit. Oh what a withering
breath is praise, and how sickly do the motives of action become,
when flattery, that _simoon_ of the heart, has passed over them!
We now communicated our embryo purpose to Tom, and told him that
we intended proceeding to work on the following day, as it was not
likely, that during the winter season, my mother would visit her
seat again. Pride and joy took possession of his countenance, as we
developed our plan; and had we presented him with a purse of gold,
I do not think that the expression of his face could have indicated
such happiness as the feeling of being thus distinguished by our
confidence, inspired.