The remainder of the autumn was passed in Lindisfarne by the different
members of the Pastor's family, with no change in the tranquil routine
of their occupations, and little apparent alteration in themselves.
Sir Anthony had made ample apologies to his nephew, and concessions to
his uncle, to justify a renewed reconciliation. He pleaded surprise and
infatuation; and as the eccentric planet, whose influence created both,
had some time reached its perihelium; it was hoped the attraction would
be too powerful to allow of its return. Mr. Athelstone, therefore,
permitted his nephew to visit as usual at the castle, till the closing
in of winter rendered the shores dangerous, and commanded the
emigration of his family to the more sheltered regions of Morewick-hall.
Louis's elastic mind, like the principle of life shooting into every
faculty of vigorous manhood, recovered all its spring; and allowing
himself to think no more of his father nor of Duke Wharton, than what
was sufficient to keep his emulation in active career to attain the
patriotic talents of the one, and the disinterested enthusiam of the
other; he devoted himself, heart and soul, to the perfect acquirement
of every branch of study which could possibly promote the great ends
of his ambition. Accustomed to labour, the buoyancy of his spirit
never admitted the touch of fatigue. Bodily exertion could not weary
his practised limbs; nor diversity of mental pursuits, distract nor
overstrain his faculties. In the full power of health, and of a mind
which care had never traversed, all things were easy to him. One hour
he was absorbed in mathematics, history, or languages; and the next
saw him in the chace, with his gun on the moor, or bounding along the
icicled heights of Morewick, by the side of Cornelia.
Alice alone had exhibited a change in her person and manners since
the visit of the noble Spaniards. She, who used to be the most
constant companion of her cousin, now hardly ever joined him in his
rambles; and always refused to be his partner in the evening dances,
which usually diversified the amusements of the hall, when any of
the neighbouring families made a part of its winter fire-side. Her
spirits and her bloom were gone; and Mrs. Coningsby at length became
so alarmed, that she seriously talked with the Pastor about taking
her in the spring to some milder climate. Louis was not insensible
to the alteration in his cousin. But those anxious attentions which,
in any former indisposition, she had always received from him with
grateful affection, were now, not merely avoided, but repelled with
evident dislike. At first he attributed this strange conduct, to some
unintentional offence on his part; and he tenderly asked her if it were
so. She burst into tears as she hurryingly replied in the negative,
and left the room. On mentioning the circumstance to Mrs. Coningsby,
it only confirmed her opinion of her daughter's illness being a latent
consumption; and that her present distaste to what before gave her
pleasure, was a symptom of that fatal disorder.
Such was the state of the family; when about four o'clock, one
dreadfully severe day in December, a person of a middle age and a
gloomy aspect, alighted from a chaise at the door of Morewick-hall;
and almost speechless with cold, was ushered into the presence of Mr.
Athelstone. The Pastor was alone in his library: and the stranger in
brief and broken English, announced himself as the Senor Castanos,
confidential secretary to the Baron de Ripperda, and a messenger to the
guardian of his son. While he spoke, he presented two packets; one from
the Baron, the other from the Marquis Santa Cruz. With his accustomed
hospitality, Mr. Athelstone bade his guest welcome; and was enquiring
after the health of the Baron and the Marquis, when Louis entered the
room. In passing through the hall, the porter told him that Peter had
just shewn an outlandish gentleman in to his uncle; and impatient to
know whether he came from Spain, Louis hastened to the library.
"My child," said the Pastor, "I believe you are near the goal of your
wishes.--This gentleman comes from your father."
The secretary bowed to the son of his patron. And Louis, looking first
at him, and then at his uncle, exclaimed--"my father!--and does he--?"
He hesitated, he stopped; the eagerness of his hopes interrupted his
articulation.
"We will open this packet, and see," returned the Pastor, taking that
from the Baron into his hand. But glancing at the shivering figure of
his guest, who had drawn near the fire, he did not break the seal, but
desiring Louis to ring the bell, requested the Senor to permit the
servant who attended, to shew him to an apartment where he should have
a change of warm garments, and proper refreshment after so inclement a
journey.
As soon as the Spaniard had withdrawn, Mr. Athelstone opened the
packet. It presented one for himself, and another for his nephew.
Never before had Louis received a letter directed to himself, from
his father. Though he always persevered in the duty of addressing his
only parent, yet, until this moment, the answers were never more than
acknowledging messages through his guardian. It was, therefore, with a
peculiar feeling of recognition; a conviction of being now owned by
his father's heart as his son; that Louis opened the first letter he
had ever received from his hand.--
Its contents were these:
"My dear Son,
"I hear from the Marquis Santa Cruz, that you are worthy the name you
bear.--That your acquirements do credit to the liberality of your
education; and that you are not deficient in ambition to bring these
implements to the test. I offer you an opportunity. Accompany the
bearer of this, to the continent.--He is my secretary:--and has my
commands to present you to a person there, who will put your talents
to the trial. Should the result be to your honour, you shall not be
long withheld from the embrace of your father, William
_Baron de Ripperda._
"Madrid,
"November, 1725."
Louis pressed these welcome commands to his lips: then turning, to
communicate their happy tidings to Mr. Athelstone, he saw the eyes of
the venerable man still bent on the other packet; while the spectacles,
which he held in his hand, bore tearful proofs how little was his
sympathy with the joy that beat in the heart of his nephew. Louis took
that trembling hand, and kissed it without speaking.
"I know, my child, that you are going to leave me.--I know that you are
glad to go;--and it is natural, but an old man's tears are natural too."
Louis grieved for the grief of his uncle: and anticipated his own pangs
in the moment of separation from so paternal a friend; from an aunt
and cousins so beloved: but he did not feel the most distant wish to
escape these pangs an hour, by delaying the journey that was to draw
him nearer to his father, and to the indistinct, but, he hoped, sure
objects of his ambition. He was indeed drawn by two attractions: the
one tender and persuading; the other, powerful and imperative; and his
soul leaped to the latter, as to its congenial element.
In a few minutes Mr. Athelstone recovered his wonted serenity. "The
time is now come," said he, "when I must put forth from my bosom the
sacred deposit I have so fondly cherished.--Yes, Louis; your spirit,
more than your years, demands its active destination; and I will not
murmur that the moment for which I have educated your mind and your
body, is at last arrived!" He then read aloud, and with composure,
the letter which the Baron had addressed to him; but it was not more
explanatory than the other, of the circumstances in which he meant to
place his son.
The secretary soon after re-entered. On Mr. Athelstone putting some
civil questions to him respecting his present fatigue, and his late
long journey; he abruptly answered, "That as his arrival had been
delayed by contrary winds at sea; and the severity of the season
did not promise a more propitious voyage, in returning; it would be
necessary for him and Mr. de Montemar to take leave of Morewick-hall
the following morning."
The Baron's letter to Mr. Athelstone, told him that Louis must yield
implicit deference to the arrangements of Castanos. And in reply to
some remonstrance from the Pastor, for a less hasty departure, the
Senor coldly observed--"That at Ostend, he and his charge were to meet
instructions for proceeding: and should they arrive there a day later
than the one fixed by the Baron, the consequence might be fatal to
their safety. Indeed, that no appendage should encumber their progress,
his Lord had commanded him to deny to Mr. de Montemar the indulgence of
taking a servant from England."
Mr. Athelstone made many enquiries, to gather something of the object
of so peremptory a summons; but he received no satisfaction from the
secretary, who, with even morose brevity, continued to affirm his
total ignorance of what was to follow the introduction of his charge to
his new guardian. His own office went no further than to conduct Mr.
de Montemar by a particular day to the continent: but who he was to
meet there, or how he was to be employed, future events must explain.
The frank-hearted Pastor, became uneasy at this mystery. And the more
so, as from the secretary's hint, (which he appeared vext at having
dropped) it seemed connected with danger. "Yet it is his father, who
summons him into such circumstances!" said he to himself; "and surely I
may trust a father's watchfulness over his only son!"
Louis's imagination had taken fire at what chilled the heart of his
uncle. That there was a demand on his courage, in the proposed trial,
swelled his youthful breast with exultation. He thought, as yet he
had only tried his strength like a boy; in exercise, or in pastime.
He wanted to grapple with danger, with the heart and the arm of a
man; and for a cause that would sanctify the hazard of his life. "And
to something like this," cried he mentally, "my father calls me! He
calls me, as becomes the son of his race, to share the labours, the
perils, of his glorious career! I am now to prove my claim to so noble
a birth-right.--And I will prove it! O gracious Heaven, give me but to
deserve honour of my father; and I ask no other blessing on this side
of eternity!"
Mr. Athelstone saw that strong emotions were agitating the occupied
mind of his nephew, and reading their import, in the lofty expressions
of his countenance, he did not check their impulse, by recalling his
attention to present objects; but proceeded in silence to open the
packet from Santa Cruz: hoping that its contents might cast a light
upon the destiny of Louis.
The letter was short: chiefly thanking the Pastor and his family,
for their kindness to himself and his son during their visit at
Lindisfarne. Writing of Ferdinand, he added that his health was
materially improved, though his spirits were yet very unequal. To
remedy these remains of his indisposition, he meant to engage himself
in the expected hostilities between Austria and Spain, who were likely
to quarrel on a question of maritime and commercial prerogative.
The Marquis concluded his letter by saying, that he enclosed three
packets from Don Ferdinand, as offerings of respect to the ladies of
Lindisfarne.
Mr. Athelstone believed he had found a clew to the affair of danger,
to which Louis was to be introduced. He did not doubt but that the
Baron also meant to engage his son in the anticipated warfare between
their Catholic and Cæsarian majesties. The halting at Ostend seemed
to corroborate this surmise, as its new commercial company was the
very dispute between the rival Powers. But still, the immediate peril
which threatened any delay in arriving there remained as unexplained as
before.
When Louis perused the Marquis's letter, he also supposed he was called
to a military life; and as that was the point to which he had most
wistfully directed his glory-attracted eye, the intimation at once
fixed his vague anticipations; and rising from his seat, while his
thoughts glanced on Wharton's gay demand _to write man upon his brow_,
he smiled on his uncle and said, "this is the _Toga virilis_ that has
ever been the object of my vows!"
"God grant," cried the Pastor, mournfully returning his playful smile,
"that it may not be steeped in blood!"
"And if found in the bed of honour," replied Louis, "I should not rest
the worse for it!"
"Yon sport, my child, with these gloomy suggestions; and may you ever
have the same cause for smiling at the advance of death! I know the
passion of your soul is to be always in the path of duty; and that in
such pursuit, the rugged and the smooth, the safe or dangerous, are to
you alike. Nourish this principle as that of your part in the covenant
of your salvation. But keep a clear eye in discerning between duty and
inclination. Remember, that no enterprize is great that is not morally
good: that war is murder, when it commences in aggression; and that
policy is villainy, when it seeks to aggrandize by injustice. In short,
in whatever you do, consider the aim of your action, and your motive in
undertaking its accomplishment. Be single-minded in all things, having
the principle of the divine laws, delivered by the Son of God himself,
as the living spring of every action throughout your life. Then, my
Louis, you may smile in life and in death! You will be above the breath
of man, beyond his power to disappoint you in your reward; for it will
abide with you in the consciousness of virtue, and a sure faith in an
eternal glory."
While the Pastor was yet speaking, Mrs. Coningsby and her daughters
entered from a Christmas visit they had been paying in the neighbouring
town of Warkworth. They started at sight of a stranger dozing in the
great chair by the fire. Overcome with fatigue, Castanos had fallen
asleep almost immediately after he had given his last unsatisfactory
reply. The entrance of the ladies roused him, and he got up heavily
from his seat, when Mr. Athelstone presented him to his niece, and
briefly told his errand. Surprize at the suddenness of the summons, and
dismay at parting with a companion so dear, overcame Mrs. Coningsby,
and she sunk fainting into a chair. Tears stole down the cheeks of
Cornelia, and Alice stood motionless, pale, and silent.
After the emotions of the shock of such intelligence had a little
subsided; anxious to divert their thoughts, Mr. Athelstone presented
his niece and her daughters with Don Ferdinand's three packets; and
repeating the young Spaniard's request that each lady would inspect her
present alone, he added his own wish, that they would indulge the donor
now. The hint was immediately adopted, for Mrs. Coningsby understood
its purport. Divining her uncle's tenderness for the sensibility of
his nieces, she left him to discuss with Louis the many arrangements
necessary to a separation, that might be final to most of the party.
The remainder of the day was hardly long enough, for the preparation of
the various comforts each inmate of the hall was solicitous to produce,
to render the journey and voyage of their beloved Louis as free of
privations as possible. In the consequent bustle, no time was allowed
for dwelling on its occasion, or giving way to the regrets which
often turned the heart faint in the midst of the body's exertions.
"To-morrow, in the hour of parting, we will indulge our sorrow. We will
then shew our Louis our love, and our grief at the separation!" With
these thoughts, Mrs. Coningsby and Cornelia stilled their often-rising
emotions; while Mr. Athelstone, reading in the feverish activity of
their services what was passing in their minds, meditated how to spare
them and his nephew the agitating hour they anticipated.
When the family parted for the night, it was settled that Louis and
his foreign conductor should not leave the hall the next morning until
after breakfast; and therefore they should all meet again round that
dear domestic table, and there exchange the dreaded word farewell. Mrs.
Coningsby observed, that before she slept she was going to write a few
lines to Don Ferdinand, to thank him for the fine Moorish shawls his
gratitude had presented to herself and daughters, and she would give
the letter to Louis in the morning. Then, as was the custom in this
affectionate family, on retiring to their rooms, he touched the cheek
of his aunt with his lips, and shook hands with his cousins when he
bade God bless them!
With a body unwearied, and a mind too excited, to admit of any sleep
this night, he was passing to his apartment, when his uncle opened
the door of his own chamber, and beckoned him in. The venerable
man, there informed him, that he alone of all the family, would bid
him farewell the next morning. That he feared the fortitude of Mrs.
Coningsby and his nieces in so severe a trial; and had therefore made
arrangements to prevent it. Louis listened with gratitude, though with
brimming eyes, to the good old man's account of his having ordered
the travelling-chaise to the lodge-gate at day-break; and that he had
prepared Senor Castanos to be ready at so unexpected an hour, and to
permit his charge to see his maternal uncle. In the usual routine of
his movements, Sir Anthony had been some time at Athelstone-manor,
where he always opened his Christmas hospitalities. As that mansion was
on the banks of the Tyne, not far from Newcastle, where the travellers
were to embark, his nephew would have an opportunity of paying his
parting duty to him, without impeding his journey by going out of the
way.
Louis left his kind guardian, with a promise of attending to the first
tap at his door next morning; and in a more pensive mood proceeded to
his dressing-room. On opening the door, he saw Alice seated by his
table. Her lamp stood beside her; and its faint light gleamed upon her
pallid features. He started with astonishment; for she had so long
estranged herself from his slightest attentions, that Alice was the
last person he could have expected to find at such a moment in his
apartment. However, he approached her tenderly. On seeing him, she
covered her face with her hand, and evidently wept, though silently;
for as he spoke and soothed her, (though vaguely, as he could not guess
the reason of this solitary visit,) he felt the tears trickle through
her fingers on his hand. At last she was able to command her speech,
though she still concealed her face; and when she did find utterance,
it was some time before she dared touch upon the secret that preyed
upon her peace and life. She told him that she was miserable; that her
health was consuming under a sense of her deception to the best of
mothers, sisters, and of guardians; and that unless she did seize this,
her last opportunity of unburthening her soul to the only friend to
whom she could do so, without breaking a fatal vow; she felt that she
must die, she could not exist much longer under the tortures of her
conscience, and the miseries of her heart.
Amazed, and alarmed, Louis listened to her, tried to calm her, and
encouraged her to repose a full confidence in him. At length, amidst
paroxysms of tears, and agonies of shame, she narrated all that had
passed between herself and Don Ferdinand; and that since she had so
rashly made him the vow of concealing their attachment from those
who ought to know all her thoughts, she had never known a moment's
happiness.
Louis was struck dumb with this recital. The brevity of her
acquaintance with Don Ferdinand, might yet be long enough to allow his
accomplished manners and interesting state, to make an impression on so
young and sympathizing a heart; she therefore found a ready excuse with
her cousin. But what was he to think of Don Ferdinand? Of the advantage
he had taken of her tender and guileless nature, to betray her into a
confession and a vow, so sure to sacrifice her peace; and which could
bring no gratification to him, but the disgraceful consciousness of a
triumph to his vanity!
Louis's fixed silence, while occupied in these thoughts, struck Alice
like the voice of condemnation. She gazed distractedly in his face,
and exclaimed in despair, "You think I am unpardonable.--You think
I deserve to die, miserable and unforgiven! Oh, wretched, guilty
Alice,--break, break your heart, for there is none to pity you!" As
she uttered this, in a hardly articulate voice, she threw herself back
into her chair, sobbing and wringing her hands in bitter anguish.
The violence of her emotions recalled Louis to recollection, and
soothing her excessive remorse with every palliative that affection
could suggest, he at last succeeded in restoring her to some degree of
composure. She told him, that her purpose in revealing her wretched
story to him at this time, was not merely to unburthen her loaded soul;
but to prevail on him to convey a letter to Ferdinand, in which she
implored him to release her from her guilty vow of concealment. "I have
warned him," continued she, "that if he hold me to this impious pledge,
it will not be for long; for I cannot live in my present self-abhorring
condition. But, should my life be lengthened under these circumstances,
to be my punishment, I will never consent to see his face again, till
he has released me from so sinful an engagement."
Louis warmly applauded her resolution.
"Do not praise me," cried she, "do not call it resolution. I am
unworthy of approbation for any thing. I do not resolve; I only feel
that I can know no happiness, endure no person, but continue to detest
myself, till this guilt is taken from my mind, by a full confession,
and prayer for my mother's pardon."
She shewed a letter, which had come in the packet directed to her
by Ferdinand, and which he had secured her receiving free from
observation, by his apparently whimsical request that each lady would
inspect her present alone. The letter contained protestations of
inviolable attachment, petitions for her constancy; and exhortations to
keep their secret, till the success of the plan he had in view, brought
him again to her feet. He had inclosed a miniature of himself in the
shawl which was his ostensible present to her. "I will never look on it
a second time," said she, "till he removes from himself the guilt of
holding me in this wicked undutifulness to my family."
Louis engaged, should he not meet him at Madrid, to forward her letter
to Don Ferdinand, and to inclose it in one from himself, enforcing her
entreaties with his arguments; and giving his thoughts on the subject,
as became his relationship to her, and fraternal regard for her
happiness. He assured her, he would do it with a scrupulous attention
not to irritate the feelings which had excited her lover to deprive him
of her sisterly affection. Aware that her self-accusing state of mind,
could not bear up against the representation he would fain have made
of Ferdinand's entire selfishness in thus binding her, Louis contented
himself with advising Alice, as a restitution she owed to her family
for all the misery her melancholy and illness had made them suffer, to
dismiss as much as possible all painful retrospections; and to console
herself with the conviction that she was now re-treading her steps to
the path of duty. "Cheer yourself with this thought," said he, "till
the tidings shall arrive which will take the seal from your lips. Then
you may confess all, and reconciled, by pardon, to your family and
yourself, you will again become the happy Alice."
She wept as he spoke. But it was no more the stormy grief of despair;
she shed the balmy tears of penitence and hope. It was the genial
shower upon the thirsty ground. "You have spoken comfort to me, Louis.
I have not been so happy, since the dawn of the fatal morning, when my
impious adjuration called down these months of misery upon my wretched
head.--Oh, if Ferdinand could have guessed this, would he have denied
me such a comforter!"
Louis gently reminded her, that as he was going, she must seek a
comforter in a Superior Being; and in the exertions of her own mind:
"you have ever, my Alice," said he, "been the idol of your family;
and even to this day, been supported with a watchfulness, as if you
were still in infancy: yet, you see, how inadequate has been all this
anxiety to preserve you from error, and its consequent sorrows! By
experience, you must now feel, that the care of the tenderest relations
can be of no permanent effect, unless you assist it with your own
circumspection and strength. Look not for comfort from one side or
another, till you have found its principle in your own bosom; that
is to say, till you resolve to act according to your duty. And this
is, not merely to grieve over your fault, and yearn to confess it and
be forgiven; but to lay a restraint upon your sensibility, and the
violence of your regrets; and from this hour to devote the whole of
your mind to the re-establishment of happiness in your family.--Return
to your former occupations.--Meditate less upon Don Ferdinand and
yourself; and think more of your mother, your sister, and your
guardian.--For their sakes, try to be cheerful, and you will be so.--In
one word, my dearest Alice, remember, that to perform our duty in this
world, we must sustain our own virtue, and not habituate ourselves to
the uncertain support of others."
"Why, my dear Louis, have I never heard these sentiments before? With
such forewarning, I should never have erred."
"You might have heard them often; for my uncle has frequently talked
to me in this way in your presence. But, my sweet Alice was not then
awakened to such subjects. You regarded them as grave discourses, in
which you could be as little interested as in the map of a country you
never intended to visit."
"And I went astray in that very country!" cried she, "simpleton that I
was; always to turn away from every thing but the pursuits of a child!"
She was anxious to engage Louis to correspond with her; but as he
could not write any thing to her that would not pass under the eye
of the whole family, he told her she had best rest satisfied with
his exertions for her release; and when he had obtained it from Don
Ferdinand, he would then write openly, and tell her all his thoughts on
an affair so momentous to her present and future happiness.
The hall clock struck one.
Alice rose: she put his hand to her lips, and smiled through her
tears:--"I cannot be at this morning's breakfast.--But now--dear,
dear, Louis,--best of friends--farewell!"--Her head dropped upon his
shoulder, where she struggled with two or three convulsive sobs. He
pressed her to his heart, and in vain tried to repel the tears which
started to his eyes: they flowed over her face as he supported her
trembling steps to the door of her apartment. When he had brought
her to the threshold, she uttered a breathless _God bless you_! and
breaking from his arms, threw herself into the room. The door was
closed:--he heard her sob:--but tearing himself away, he returned with
a heavy load at his heart to his own chamber.