ONE DAY.
In times of great sorrow the godly person ought to look forward to
the never-ending joy and happiness that will follow this short life.
Yet we still look backwards to the happy time that is past and can
never come again. And then, how happy does it seem to have been in
comparison with present affliction!
It pleased Heaven after many trials to restore my earthly
happiness--at least, in its principal part, which is earthly love.
Some losses--grievous and lamentable--there were which could not be
restored. Yet for a long time I had no other comfort (apart from
that hope which I trust was never suffered to leave me) than the
recollection of one single day in its course, too short, from dewy
morn till dusky eve. I began that day with the sweetest joy that a
girl can ever experience--namely, the return of her lover and the
happiness of learning that he loves her more than ever, with the
knowledge that her heart hath gone forth from her and is wholly his.
To such a girl the woods and fields become the very garden of Eden;
the breath of the wind is as the voice of the Lord blessing another
Eve; the very showers are the tears of gladness and gratitude; the
birds sing hymns of praise; the leaves of the trees whisper words
of love; the brook prattles of kisses; the flowers offer incense;
the royal course of the sun in splendour, the glories of the sunrise
and sunset, the twinkling stars of night, the shadows of the flying
clouds, the pageant of the summer day--these are all prepared for
that one happy girl and for her happy lover! Oh, Divine Gift of
Love! which thus gives the whole world with its fruits in season to
each pair in turn! Nay, doth it not create them anew? What was Adam
without Eve? And Eve was created for no other purpose than to be a
companion to the man.
I say, then, that the day when Robin took me in his arms and kissed
me--not as he had done when we parted and I was still a child, but
with the fervent kiss of a lover--was the happiest day in all my
life. I say that I have never forgotten that day, but, by recalling
any point of it, I remember all: how he held my hand and how he
made me confess that I loved him; how we kissed and parted, to meet
again. As for poor Humphrey, I hardly gave him so much as a thought
of pity. Then, how we wandered along the brook hand in hand!
'Never to part again, my dear,' said the fond lover. 'Here will
we live, and here we will die. Let Benjamin become, if he please,
Lord Chancellor, and Humphrey a great physician: they will have to
live among men in towns, where every other man is a rogue. We shall
live in this sweet country place, where the people may be rude but
they are not knaves. Why, in that great city of London, where the
merchants congregate upon the Exchange and look so full of dignity
and wisdom, each man is thinking all the time that, if he fail to
overreach his neighbour, that neighbour will overreach him. Who
would live such a life when he can pass it in the fields with such a
companion as my Alice?'
The pleasures of London had only increased his thirst for the
country life. Surely, never was seen a swain more truly rustic in
all his thoughts! The fine ladies at the playhouse, with their
painted faces, made him, he told me, think of one who wore a russet
frock in Somersetshire, and did not paint her sweet face--this was
the way he talked. The plays they acted could never even be read,
much less witnessed, by that dear girl--so full of wickedness they
were. At the assemblies the ladies were jealous of each other, and
put on scornful looks when one seemed preferred; at the taverns
the men drank and bellowed songs and quarrelled; in the streets
they fought and took the wall and swaggered; there was nothing but
fighting among the baser sort, with horrid imprecations; at the
coffee-houses the politicians argued and quarrelled. Nay, in the
very churches the sermons were political arguments, and while the
clergyman read his discourse the gallants ogled the ladies. All this
and more he told me.
To hear my boy, one would think there was nothing in London but what
was wicked and odious. No doubt it is a wicked place; where many men
live together, those who are wicked easily find each other out, and
are encouraged in their wickedness. Yet there must be many honest
and God-fearing persons, otherwise the Judgment of Heaven would
again fall upon that city as it did in the time of the Plague and in
the Great Fire.
'My pretty Puritan,' said Robin, 'I am now come away from that
place, and I hope never to see it again. Oh! native hills, I salute
you! Oh! woods and meadows, I have returned, to wander again in
your delightful shade.' Then, which was unusual in my boy, and would
have better become Mr. Boscorel or Humphrey, he began to repeat
verses. I knew not that he had ever learned any:--
As I range these spacious fields,
Feast on all that Nature yields;
Everything inspires delight,
Charms my smell, my taste, my sight;
Every rural sound I hear
Soothes my soul and tunes my ear.
I do not know where Robin found these verses, but as he repeated
them, waving his arm around, I thought that Humphrey himself never
made sweeter lines.
He then told me how Humphrey would certainly become the most learned
physician of the time, and that he was already master of a polite
and dignified manner which would procure him the patronage of
the great and the confidence of all. It was pleasant to hear him
praise his cousin without jealousy or envy. To be sure, he knew not
then--though afterwards I told him--that Humphrey was his rival.
Even had he known this, such was the candour of my Robin and the
integrity of his soul that he would have praised him even more
loudly.
One must not repeat more of the kind and lovely things that the dear
boy said while we strolled together by the brook-side.
While thus abroad we walked--'twas in the forenoon, after Humphrey's
visit--Sir Christopher, his grandfather, dressed in his best coat
and his gold-laced hat, which he commonly kept for church, and
accompanied by Madam, walked from the Manor House through the
village till they came to our cottage. Then, with great ceremony,
they entered, Sir Christopher bowing low and Madam dropping a deep
courtesy to my mother, who sat humbly at her wheel.
'Madam,' said Sir Christopher, 'we would, with your permission, say
a few words with the learned Dr. Eykin and yourself.'
My father, who had now returned and was in his room, came forth when
he was called. His face had recovered something of its serenity, but
his eyes were still troubled. Madam sat down, but Sir Christopher
and my father stood.
'Sir,' said his Honour, 'I will proceed straight to the point. My
grandson desires to marry your daughter Alice. Robin is a good
lad--not a scholar if you will--for his religion, the root of the
matter is in him; for the goodness of his heart I will answer; for
his habit of life, he hath, so far as we can learn, acquired no vile
vices of the city--he doth neither drink nor gamble, nor waste his
health and strength in riotous living; and for his means they are my
own. All that I have will be his. 'Tis no great estate, but 'twill
serve him as it hath served me. Sir, the boy's mother and I have
come to ask your daughter in marriage. We know her worth, and we
are right well satisfied that our boy hath made so good and wise a
choice.'
'They were marrying and giving in marriage when the Flood came; they
will be marrying and giving in marriage in the Great Day of the
Lord,' said my father.
'Yes, gossip; but that is no reason why they should not now be
marrying and giving in marriage.'
'You ask my consent?' said my father. 'This surprises me. The child
is too young: she is not yet of marriageable age'----
'Husband, she is nigh upon her twentieth birthday!'
'I thought she had been but twelve or thereabouts! My consent?
Why, Sir Christopher, in the eyes of the world this is great
condescension on your part to take a penniless girl. I looked, I
suppose, to the marriage of my daughter some time--perhaps to a
farmer--yet--yet, we are told that a virtuous woman hath a price far
above rubies; and that it is she who buildeth up the house, and we
are nowhere told that she must bring her husband a purse of gold.
Sir Christopher, it would be the blackest ingratitude in us to deny
you, even if this thing were (which I say not) against the mind of
our daughter.'
'It is not--it is not,' said my mother.
'Wherefore, seeing that the young man is a good man as youths go,
though in the matter of the Latin syntax he hath yet much to learn;
and that his heart is disposed towards religion, I am right glad
that he should take our girl to wife.'
'Bravely said!' cried Sir Christopher. 'Hands upon it, man! And we
will have a merry wedding. But to-day I bid you both to come and
feast with us. We will have holiday and rejoicing.'
'Yes,' said my father, 'we will feast; though to-morrow comes the
Deluge.' I know now what he meant, but at that time we knew not, and
it seemed to his Honour a poor way of rejoicing at the return of the
boys and the betrothal of his daughter thus to be foretelling woes.
'The Vision of the Plumb-line is before mine eyes,' my father went
on. 'Is the land able to bear all this? We talk of feasting and of
marriages. Yet a few days, or perhaps already----But we will rejoice
together, my old friend and benefactor, we will rejoice together.'
With these strange words he turned and went back to his room, and
after some tears with my mother, Madam went home and Sir Christopher
with her. But in honour to the day he kept on his best coat.
Robin suffered me to go home, but only that I might put on my best
frock (I had but two) and make my hair straight, which had been
blown into curls, as was the way with my hair. And then, learning
from my mother with the utmost satisfaction what had passed, he led
me by the hand, as if I were already his bride, and so to the Manor
House, where first Sir Christopher saluted me with great kindness,
calling me his dear granddaughter, and saying that next to Robin's
safe return he asked for nothing more than to see me Robin's wife.
And Madam kissed me, with tears in her eyes, and said that she could
desire nothing better for her son, and that she was sure I should do
my best endeavours to make the boy happy. Then Humphrey, as quietly
as if he had not also asked me to be his wife, kissed my hand, and
wished me joy; and Mr. Boscorel also kissed me, and declared that
Robin ought to be the happiest dog on earth. And so we sat down to
our feast.
The conversation at dinner was graver than the occasion demanded.
For though our travellers continually answered questions about the
foreign lands and peoples they had seen, yet the subject returned
always to the condition of the country, and to what would happen.
After dinner we sat in the garden, and the gentlemen began to talk
of Right Divine and of Non-Resistance, and here it seemed to me
as if Mr. Boscorel was looking on as from an eminence apart. For
when he had once stated the texts and arguments upon which the
High Church party do mostly rely, he retired and made no further
objections, listening in silence while my father held forth upon
the duty of rising against wicked princes. At last, however, being
challenged to reply by Humphrey, Mr. Boscorel thus made answer:
'The doctrine that subjects may or may not rebel against their
Sovereign is one which I regard with interest so long as it remains
a question of logic and argument only. Unfortunately, the times are
such that we may be called upon to make a practical application of
it: in which case there may follow once more civil war, with hard
knocks on both sides, and much loss of things temporal. Wherefore
to my learned brother's arguments, which I admit to be plausible, I
will, for the present, offer no reply, except to pray Heaven that
the occasion may not arise of converting a disputed doctrine into a
rule of conduct.'
Alas! even while he spoke the messenger was speeding swiftly towards
us who was to call upon all present to take a side.
The question is now, I hope, decided for ever: but many men had
first to die. It was not decided then, but three years later, when
King William cut the knot, and, with the applause of the nation,
pulled down his father-in-law, and mounted the throne himself with
his gracious consort. We are agreed, at last, that kings, like
judges, generals, and all great officers of State, are to hold their
offices in good behaviour. If they enter into machinations against
the liberty of the people and desert the national religion, they
must descend, and let others take their place. But before that right
could be established for the country, streams of blood must first
flow.
While they talked, we--I mean Madam, my mother, and myself--sat
and listened. But my mind was full of another subject, and I heard
but little of what was said, noting chiefly the fiery ardour of my
father and the careless grace of Mr. Boscorel.
Presently my father, who was never easy in the company of Mr.
Boscorel--(so oil and water will not agree to fill a cup in
friendship)--and, besides, being anxious to rejoin the society of
his books, arose and went away, and with him my mother--he, in
his ragged cassock, who was a learned scholar; she in her plain
home-spun, who was a gentlewoman by birth. Often had I thought of
our poverty with bitterness. But now it was with a softened heart
that I saw them walk side by side across the lawns. For now I
understood plainly--and for the first time--how love can strengthen
and console. My mother was poor, but she was not therefore unhappy.
Mr. Boscorel also rose and went away with Humphrey. They went to
talk of things more interesting to the Rector than the doctrine of
Non-Resistance: of painting, namely, and statuary and medals. And
when we presently walked from the Rectory gardens we heard a most
gladsome scraping of fiddlestrings within, which showed that the
worthy man was making the most of Humphrey's return.
When Sir Christopher had taken his pipe of tobacco he fell asleep.
Robin and I walked in the garden and renewed our vows. Needs must
that I should tell him all that I had done or thought since he went
away. As if the simple thoughts of a country maid should be of
interest to a man! Yet he seemed pleased to question and to listen,
and presently broke into a rapture, swearing that he was in love
with an angel. Young lovers, it is feared, may fall into grievous
sin by permitting themselves these extravagances of speech and
thought; yet it is hard to keep them sober, and besides (because
every sin in man meeteth with its correspondent in woman), if the
lover be extravagant, the maiden takes pleasure in his extravagance.
To call a mortal, full of imperfections, an angel, is little short
of blasphemy. Yet I heard it with, I confess, a secret pleasure. We
know ourselves and the truth concerning ourselves; we do not deceive
ourselves as to our imperfections; yet we are pleased that our
lovers should so speak and think of us as if we were angels indeed.
Robin told me, presently ceasing his extravagances for a while, that
he was certain something violent was on foot. To be sure, everybody
expected so much. He said, moreover, that he believed Humphrey had
certain knowledge of what was going to happen; that before they
left the Low Countries Humphrey had been present at a meeting of
the exiles in Rotterdam, where it was well known that Lord Argyle's
expedition was resolved upon; that he had been much engaged in
London after their return, and had paid many visits, the nature of
which he kept secret; and that on the road there was not a town and
scarcely a village where Humphrey had not someone to visit.
'My dear,' he said, 'Humphrey is slight as to stature and strength,
but he carries a stout heart. There is no man more bitter against
the King than he, and none more able if his counsels were listened
to. Monmouth, I am certain, purposes to head an expedition into
England like that of Lord Argyle in Scotland. The history of England
hath many instances of such successful attempts. King Stephen, King
Henry IV., King Henry VII., are all examples. If Monmouth lands,
Humphrey will join him, I am sure. And I, my dear'----he paused.
'And you too, Robin? Oh! must you too go forth to fight? And yet, if
the Duke doth head a rising all the world would follow. Oh! to drive
away the Papist King and restore our liberty!'
'My dear, I will do what my grandfather approves. If it be my duty
to go, he will send me forth.'
I had almost forgotten to say that Madam took me to her own chamber,
where she opened a box and pulled out a gold chain, very fine. This
she hung about my neck, and bade me sit down, and gave me some sound
advice, reminding me that woman was the weaker vessel, and should
look to her husband not only to love and cherish her, but also to
prevent her from falling into certain grievous sins, as of temper,
deceitfulness, vanity, and the like, to which the weaker nature is
ever prone. Many other things she said, being a good and virtuous
woman, but I pass them over.
After supper we went again into the garden, the weather being warm
and fine. The sun went down, but the sky was full of light, though
it was past nine o'clock and time for me to go home and to bed. Yet
we lingered. The birds had gone to sleep; there was no whisper of
the wind; the village was in silence. And Robin was whispering in
my ear. I remember--I remember the very tones of his voice, which
was low and sweet. I remember the words he said: 'Sweet love! Sweet
love! How could I live so long without thee!' I remember my swelling
heart and my glowing cheeks. Oh! Robin--Robin! Oh! poor heart! poor
maid! The memory of this one day was nearly all thou hadst to feed
upon for so long--so long a time!