CHARLOTTE.
"Oh, how this spring of love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day!"
"Hammering and clinking, chattering stony names
Of shale and hornblende, rag and trap and tuff,
Amygdaloid and trachyte."
When Charlotte again went to Up-Hill she found herself walking through a
sober realm of leafless trees. The glory of autumn was gone. The hills,
with their circular sheep-pens, were now brown and bare; and the plaided
shepherds, descending far apart, gave only an air of loneliness to the
landscape. She could see the white line of the stony road with a sad
distinctness. It was no longer bordered with creeping vines and patches
of murmuring bee-bent heather. And the stream-bed also had lost nearly
all its sentinel rushes, and the tall brakens from its shaggy slopes
were gone. But Silver Beck still ran musically over tracts of tinkling
stones; and, through the chilly air, the lustered black cock was
crowing for the gray hen in the hollow.
Very soon the atmosphere became full of misty rain; and ere she reached
the house, there was a cold wind, and the nearest cloud was sprinkling
the bubbling beck. It was pleasant to see Ducie at the open door ready
to welcome her; pleasant to get into the snug houseplace, and watch the
great fire leaping up the chimney, and throwing lustres on the carved
oak presses and long settles, and on the bright brass and pewter
vessels, and the rows of showy chinaware. Very pleasant to draw her
chair to the little round table on the hearthstone, and to inhale the
fragrance of the infusing tea, and the rich aroma of potted char and
spiced bread and freshly-baked cheese-cakes. And still more pleasant to
be taken possession of, to have her damp shoes and cloak removed, her
chill fingers warmed in a kindly, motherly clasp, and to be made to feel
through all her senses that she was indeed "welcome as sun-shining."
With a little shiver of disappointment she noticed that there were only
two tea-cups on the table; and the house, when she came to analyze its
atmosphere, had in it the perceptible loneliness of the absent master.
"Is not Stephen at home?" she asked, as Ducie settled herself
comfortably for their meal; "I thought Stephen was at home."
"No, he isn't. He went to Kendal three days ago about his fleeces.
Whitney's carpet-works have made him a very good offer. Did not the
squire speak of it?"
"No."
"Well he knew all about it. He met Steve, and Steve told him. The squire
has been a little queer with us lately, Charlotte. Do you know what the
trouble is? I thought I would have you up to tea, and ask you; so when
Sandal was up here this morning, I said, 'Let Charlotte come, and have a
cup of tea with me, squire, I'd be glad.' And he said, 'When?' And I
said, 'This afternoon. I am fair lonely without Steve.' And he said,
'I'm agreeable. She'll be glad enough to come.' And I said, 'Thank'ee,
squire, I'll be glad enough to see her.' But what _is_ the matter,
Charlotte? The squire has been in his airs with Steve ever so long."
Then Charlotte's face grew like a flame; and she answered, in a tone of
tender sadness, "Father thinks Steve loves me; and he says there is no
love-line between our houses, and that, if there were, it is crossed
with sorrow, and that neither the living nor the dead will have marriage
between Steve and me."
"I thought that was the trouble. I did so. As for the living, he speaks
for himself; as for the dead, it is your grandmother Sandal he thinks
of. She was a hard, proud woman, Charlotte. Her two daughters rejoiced
at their wedding-days, and two out of her three sons she drove away from
their home. Your father was on the point of going, when his brother
Launcie's death made him the heir. Then she gave him a bit more respect,
and for pretty Alice Morecombe's sake he stayed by the old squire. Ten
years your mother waited for William Sandal, Charlotte."
"Yes, I know."
"Do you love Steve, Charlotte? I am Steve's mother, dear, and you may
speak to me as if you were talking to your own heart. I would never tell
Steve either this way or that way for any thing. Steve would not thank
me if I did. He is one of them that wants to reach his happiness in his
own way, and by his own hand. And I have good reasons for asking you
such a question, or I would not ask it; you may be sure I have, that you
may."
Charlotte had put down her cup, and she sat with her hands clasped upon
her lap, looking down into it. Ducie's question took her by surprise,
and she was rather offended by it. For Charlotte Sandal had been taught
all the reticences of good society, and for a moment she resented a
catechism so direct and personal; but only for a moment. Before Ducie
had done speaking, she had remembered that nothing but true kindness
could have prompted the inquiry. Ducie was not a curious, tattling,
meddlesome woman; Charlotte had never known her to interfere in any
one's affairs. She had few visitors, and she made no calls. Year in and
year out, Ducie could always be found at home with herself.
"You need not tell me, dear, if you do not know; or if you do not want
to tell me."
"I do know, Ducie; and I do not mind telling you in the least. I love
Stephen very dearly. I have loved him ever since--I don't know when."
"And you have always had as good and as true as you have given. Steve is
fondly heart-grown to you, Charlotte. But we will say no more; and what
we have said is dropped into my heart like a stone dropped into deep
water."
Then they spoke of the rector, how he was failing a little; and of one
of the maids at Seat-Sandal who was to marry the head shepherd at
Up-Hill; and at last, when there had been enough of indifferent talk to
effectually put Steve out of mind, Ducie asked suddenly, "How is Harry,
and is he doing well?"
This was a subject Charlotte was glad to discuss with Ducie. Harry was a
great favorite with her, and had been accustomed to run to Up-Hill
whenever he was in any boyish scrape. And Harry was _not_ doing well.
"Father is vexed and troubled about him, Ducie," she answered. "Whenever
a letter comes from Harry, it puts every thing wrong in the house.
Mother goes away and cries; and Sophia sulks because, she says, 'it is a
shame any single one of the family should be allowed to make all the
rest uncomfortable.'"
"Harry should never have gone into the army. He hasn't any resisting
power, hasn't Harry. And there is nothing but temptation in the army.
Dear me, Charlotte! We may well pray not to be led into the way of
temptation; for if we once get into it, we are no better off than a fly
in a spider's web."
She was filling the two empty cups as she spoke, but she suddenly set
down the teapot, and listened a moment. "I hear Steve's footsteps. Sit
still, Charlotte. He is opening the door. I knew it was he."
"Mother! mother!"
"Here I am, Steve."
He came in rosy and wet with his climb up the fellside; and, as he
kissed his mother, he put out his hand to Charlotte. Then there was the
pleasantest stir of care and welcome imaginable; and Steve soon found
himself sitting opposite the girl he loved so dearly, taking his cup
from her hands, looking into her bright, kind eyes, exchanging with her
those charming little courtesies which can be made the vehicles of so
much that is not spoken, and that is understood without speech.
But the afternoons were now very short, and the happy meal had to be
hastened. The clouds, too, had fallen low; and the rain, as Ducie said,
"was plashing and pattering badly." She folded her own blanket-shawl
around Charlotte; and as there was no wind, and the road was mostly wide
enough for two, Steve could carry an umbrella, and get her safely home
before the darkening.
How merrily they went out together into the storm! Steve thought he
could hardly have chosen any circumstances that would have pleased him
better. It was quite necessary that Charlotte should keep close to his
side; it was quite natural that she should lift her face to his in
talking; it was equally natural that Steve should bend towards
Charlotte, and that, in a moment, without any conscious intention of
doing so, he should kiss her.
She trembled and stood still, but she was not angry. "That was very
wrong, Steve. I told you at the harvest-home what father said, and what
I had promised father. I'll break no squares with father, and you must
not make me do so."
"I could not help it, Charlotte, you looked so bewitching."
"Oh, dear! the old, old excuse, 'The woman tempted me,' etc."
"Forgive me, dear Charlotte. I was going to tell you that I had been
very fortunate in Kendal, and next week I am going to Bradford to learn
all about spinning and weaving and machinery. But what is success
without you? If I make every dream come to pass, and have not Charlotte,
my heart will keep telling me, night and day, '_All for nothing, all for
nothing_.'"
"Do not be so impatient. You are making trouble, and forespeaking
disappointment. Before you have learned all about manufacturing, and
built your mill, before you are really ready to begin your life's work,
many a change may have taken place in Sandal-Side. When Julius comes at
Christmas I think he will ask Sophia to marry him, and I think Sophia
will accept his offer. That marriage would open the way for our
marriage."
"Only partly I fear. I can see that squire Sandal has taken a dislike,
and your mother was a little high with me when I saw her last."
"Partly your own fault, sir. Why did you give up the ways of your
fathers? The idea of mills and trading in these dales is such a new
one."
"But a man must move with his own age, Charlotte. There is no prospect
of another Stuart rebellion. I cannot do the queen's service, and get
rewarded as old Christopher Sandal did. And I want to go to Parliament,
and can't go without money. And I can't make money quick enough by
keeping sheep and planting wheat. But manufacturing means money, land,
influence, power."
"Father does not see these things as you do, Steve. He sees the peaceful
dales invaded by white-faced factory-hands, loud-voiced, quarrelling,
disrespectful. All the old landmarks and traditions will disappear; also
simple ways of living, calm religion, true friendships. Every good old
sentiment will be gauged by money, will finally vanish before money, and
what the busy world calls 'improvements.' It makes him fretful, jealous,
and unhappy."
"That is just the trouble, Charlotte. When a man has not the spirit of
his age, he has all its unhappiness. But my greatest fear is, that you
will grow weary of waiting for _our hour_."
"I have told you that I shall not. There is an old proverb which says,
'Trust not the man who promises with an oath.' Is not my simple word,
then, the best and the surest hope?"
Then she nestled close to his side, and began to talk of his plans and
his journey, and to anticipate the time when he would break ground upon
Silver Beck, and build the many-windowed factory that had been his dream
ever since he had began to plan his own career. The wind rose, the rain
fell in a down-pour before they reached the park-gates; but there was a
certain joy in facing the wet breeze, and although they did not loiter,
yet neither did they hurry. In both their hearts there was a little fear
of the squire, but neither spoke of it. Charlotte would not suppose or
suggest any necessity for avoiding him, and Steve was equally sensitive
on the subject.
When they arrived at Seat-Sandal the main entrance was closed, and
Stephen stood with her on the threshold until a man-servant opened
slowly its ponderous panels. There was a bright fire burning in the
hall, and lights were in the sconces on the walls. Charlotte asked Steve
to come in and rest a while. She tried to avoid showing either fear or
hurry, and Steve was conscious of the same effort on his own part; but
yet he knew that they both thought it well none of the family were aware
of her return, or of his presence. She watched him descend the dripping
steps into the darkness, and then went towards the fire. An unusual
silence was in the house. She stood upon the hearthstone while the
servant rebolted the door, and then asked,--
"Is dinner served, Noel?"
"It be over, Miss Charlotte."
So she went to her own room. It was chilly and dreary. The fire had been
allowed to die down, and had only just been replenished. It was smoking
also, and the candles on her toilet-table burned dimly in the damp
atmosphere. She hurriedly changed her gown, and was going down-stairs,
when a movement in Sophia's room arrested her attention. It was very
unusual for Sophia to be up-stairs at that hour, and the fact struck her
significantly. She knocked at the door, and was told rather irritably to
"Come in."
"Dear me, Sophia! what is the matter? It feels as if there were
something wrong in the house."
"I suppose there is something wrong. Father got a letter from Harry by
the late post, and he left his dinner untouched; and mother is in her
room crying, of course. I do think it is a shame that Harry is allowed
to turn the house upside down whenever he feels like it."
"Perhaps he is in trouble."
"He is always in trouble, for he is always busy making trouble. His very
amusements mean trouble for all who have the misfortune to have any
thing to do with him. Julius told me that no man in the 'Cameronians'
had a worse name than Harry Sandal."
"Julius! The idea of Julius talking badly about our Harry, and to you! I
wonder you listened to him. It was a shabby thing to do; it was that."
"Julius only repeated what he had heard, and he was very sorry to do so.
He felt it to be conscientiously his duty."
"Bah! God save me from such a conscience! If Julius had heard any thing
good of Harry, he would have had no conscientious scruples about
silence; not he! I dare say Julius would be glad if poor Harry was out
of his way."
"Charlotte Sandal, you shall not say such very unladylike, such
unchristianlike, things in my room. It is quite easy to see _whose_
company you have been in."
"I have been with Ducie. Can you find me a sweeter or better soul?"
"Or a handsomer young man than her son?"
"I mean that also, certainly. Handsome, energetic, enterprising, kind,
religious."
"Spare me the balance of your adjectives. We all know that Steve is
square on every side, and straight in every corner. Don't be so earnest;
you fatigue me to-night. I am on the verge of a nervous headache, and I
really think you had better leave me." She turned her chair towards the
fire as she spoke, and hardly palliated this act of dismissal by the
faint "excuse me," which accompanied it. And Charlotte made no remark,
though she left her sister's room, mentally promising herself to keep
away from it in the future.
She went next to the parlor. The squire's chair was empty, and on the
little stand at its side, the "Gentleman's Magazine" lay uncut. His
slippers, usually assumed after dinner, were still warming on the white
sheepskin rug before the fire. But the large, handsome face, that
always made a sunshiny feeling round the hearth, was absent; and the
room had a loneliness that made her heart fear. She waited a few
minutes, looking with expectation towards a piece of knitting which was
Mrs. Sandal's evening work. But the ivory needles and the colored wools
remained uncalled for, and she grew rapidly impatient, and went to her
mother's room. Mrs. Sandal was lying upon her couch, exhausted with
weeping; and the squire sat holding his head in his hands, the very
picture of despondency and sorrow.
"Can I come and speak to you, mother?"
The squire answered, "To be sure you can, Charlotte. We are glad to see
you. We are in trouble, my dear."
"Is it Harry, father?"
"Trouble mostly comes that way. Yes, it is Harry. He is in a great
strait, and wants five hundred pounds, Charlotte; five hundred pounds,
dear, and he wants it at once. Only six weeks ago he wrote in the same
way for a hundred and fifty pounds. He is robbing me, robbing his
mother, robbing Sophia and you."
"William, I wouldn't give way to temper that road; calling your own son
and my son a thief. It's not fair," said Mrs. Sandal, with considerable
asperity.
"I must call things by their right names, Alice. I call a cat, a cat;
and I call our Harry a thief; for I don't know that forcing money from a
father is any better than forcing it from a stranger. It is only using a
father's love as a pick-lock instead of an iron tool. That's all the
difference, Alice; and I don't think the difference is one that helps
Harry's case much. Eh? What?"
"Dear me! it is always money," sighed Charlotte.
"Your father knows very well that Harry must have the money, Charlotte.
I think it is cruel of him to make every one ill before he gives what is
sure to be given in the end. Sophia has a headache, I dare say, and I am
sure I have."
"But I cannot give him this money, Alice. I have not realized on my wool
and wheat yet. I cannot coin money. I will not beg or borrow it. I will
not mortgage an acre for it."
"And you will let your only son the heir of Sandal-Side, go to jail and
disgrace for five hundred pounds. I never heard tell of such cruelty.
Never, never, never!"
"You do not know what you are saying, Alice. Tell me how I am to find
five hundred pounds. Eh? What?"
"There must be ways. How can a woman tell?"
"Father, have I not got some money of my own?"
"You have the accrued interest on the thousand pounds your grandmother
left you. Sophia has the same."
"Is the interest sufficient?"
"You have drawn from it at intervals. I think there is about three
hundred pounds to your credit."
"Sophia will have nearly as much. Call her, father. Surely between us we
can arrange five hundred pounds. I shall be real glad to help Harry.
Young men have so many temptations now, father. Harry is a good sort in
the main. Just have a little patience with him. Eh, father?"
And the squire was glad of the pleading voice. Glad for some one to make
the excuses he did not think it right to make. Glad to have the little
breath of hope that Charlotte's faith in her brother gave him. He stood
up, and took her face between his hands and kissed it. Then he sent a
servant for Sophia; and after a short delay the young lady appeared,
looking pale and exceedingly injured.
"Did you send for me, father?"
"Yes, I did. Come in and sit down. There is something to be done for
Harry, and we want your help, Sophia. Eh? What?"
She pushed a chair gently to the table, and sat down languidly. She was
really sick, but her air and attitude was that of a person suffering an
extremity of physical anguish. The squire looked at her and then at
Charlotte with dismay and self-reproach.
"Harry wants five hundred pounds, Sophia."
"I am astonished he does not want five thousand pounds. Father, I would
not send him a sovereign of it. Julius told me about his carryings-on."
She could hardly have said any words so favorable to Harry's cause. The
squire was on the defensive for his own side in a moment.
"What has Julius to do with it?" he cried. "Sandal-Side is not his
property, and please God it never will be. Harry is one kind of a
sinner, Julius is another kind of a sinner. God Almighty only knows
which kind of sinner is the meaner and worse. The long and the short of
it, is this: Harry must have five hundred pounds. Charlotte is willing
to give the balance of her interest account, about three hundred pounds,
towards it. Will you make up what is lacking, out of your interest
money? Eh? What?"
"I do not know why I should be asked to do this, I am sure."
"Only because I have no ready money at present. And because, however bad
Harry is, he is your brother. And because he is heir of Sandal, and the
honor of the name is worth saving. And because your mother will break
her heart if shame comes to Harry. And there are some other reasons too;
but if mother, brother, and honor don't seem worth while to you, why,
then, Sophia, there is no use wasting words. Eh? What?"
"Let father have what is needed, Sophia. I will pay you back."
"Very well, Charlotte; but I think it is most unjust, most iniquitous,
as Julius says"--
"Now, then, don't quote Julius to me. What right had he to be discussing
my family matters, or Sandal matters either, I wonder? Eh? What?"
"He is in the family."
"Is he? Very well, then, I am still the head of the family. If he has
any advice to offer, he can come to me with it. Eh? What?"
"Father, I am as sick as can be to-night."
"Go thy ways then. Mother and I are both poorly too. Good-night, girls,
both." And he turned away with an air of hopeless depression, that was
far more pitiful than the loudest complaining.
The sisters went away together, silent, and feeling quite "out" with
each other. But Sophia really had a nervous attack, and was shivery and
sick with it. By the lighted candle in her hand, Charlotte saw that her
very lips were white, and that heavy tears were silently rolling down
her wan cheeks. They washed all of Charlotte's anger away; she forgot
her resolution not to enter her sister's room again, and at its door she
said, "Let me stay with you till you can sleep, Sophia; or I will go,
and ask Ann to make you a cup of strong coffee. You are suffering very
much."
"Yes, I am suffering; and father knows how I do suffer with these
headaches, and that any annoyance brings them on; and yet, if Harry
cries out at Edinburgh, every one in Seat-Sandal must be put out of
their own way to help him. And I do think it is a shame that our little
fortunes are to be crumbled as a kind of spice into his big fortune. If
Harry does not know the value of money I do."
"I will pay you back every pound. I really do not care a bit about
money. I have all the dress I want. You buy books and music, I do not.
I have no use for my money except to make happiness with it; and, after
all, that is the best interest I can possibly get."
"Very well. Then, you can pay Harry's debts if it gives you pleasure. I
suppose I am a little peculiar on this subject. Last Sunday, when the
rector was preaching about the prodigal son, I could not help thinking
that the sympathy for the bad young man was too much. I know, if I had
been the elder brother, I should have felt precisely as he did. I don't
think he ought to be blamed. And it would certainly have been more just
and proper for the father to have given the feast and the gifts to the
son who never at any time transgressed his commandments. You see,
Charlotte, that parable is going on all over the world ever since; going
on right here in Seat-Sandal; and I am on the elder brother's side.
Harry has given me a headache to-night; and I dare say he is enjoying
himself precisely as the Jerusalem prodigal did before the swine husks,
when it was the riotous living."
"Have a cup of coffee, Sophy. I'll go down for it. You are just as
trembly and excited as you can be."
"Very well; thank you, Charlotte. You always have such a bright, kind
face. I am afraid I do not deserve such a good sister."
"Yes, you do deserve all I can help or pleasure you in." And then, when
the coffee had been taken, and Sophia lay restless and wide-eyed upon
her bed, Charlotte proposed to read to her from any book she desired; an
offer involving no small degree of self-denial, for Sophia's books were
very rarely interesting, or even intelligible, to her sister. But she
lifted the nearest two, Barret's "Maga," and "The Veiled Prophet," and
rather dismally asked which it was to be?
"Neither of them, Charlotte. The 'Maga' makes me think, and I know you
detest poetry. I got a letter to-night from Agnes Bulteel, and it
appears to be about Professor Sedgwick. I was so annoyed at Harry I
could not feel any interest in it then; but, if you don't object, I
should like to hear you read it now."
"Object? No, indeed. I think a great deal of the old professor. What gay
times father and I have had on the Screes with him, and his hammer and
leather bags! And, as Agnes writes a large, round hand, and does not
fresco her letters, I can read about the professor easily."
RESPECTED MISS SANDAL,--I have such a thing to tell you
about Professor Sedgwick and our Joe; hoping that the squire or
Miss Charlotte may see him, and let him know that Joe meant no harm
at all. One hot forenoon lately, when we were through at home, an
old gentlemanly make of a fellow came into our fold, and said,
quite natural, that he wanted somebody to go with him on to the
fells. We all stopped, and took a good look at him before anybody
spoke; but at last father said, middling sharp-like,--he always
speaks that way, does father, when we're busy,--
"We've something else to do here than go raking over the fells on a
fine day like this with nobody knows who."
He gave father a lile, cheerful bit of a laugh, and said he didn't
want to hinder work; but he would give anybody that knew the fells
well a matter of five shillings to go with him, and carry his two
little bags. And father says to our Joe, "Away with thee! It's a
crown more than ever thou was worth at home." So the strange man
gave Joe two little leather bags to carry; and Joe thought he was
going to make his five shillings middling easy, for he never
expected he would find any thing on the fells to put into the bags.
But Joe was mistaken. The old gentleman, he said, went louping over
wet spots and great stones, and scraffling over crags and screes,
till you would have thought he was some kin to a Herdwick sheep.
Charlotte laughed heartily at this point. "It is just the way Sedgwick
goes on. He led father and me exactly such a chase one day last June."
"I dare say he did. I remember you looked like it. Go on."
After a while he began looking hard at all the stones and crags he
came to; and then he took to breaking lumps off them with a queer
little hammer he had with him, and stuffing the bits into the bags
that Joe was carrying. He fairly capped Joe then. He couldn't tell
what to make of such a customer. At last Joe asked him why ever he
came so far up the fell for little bits of stone, when he might get
so many down in the dales? He laughed, and went on knapping away
with his little hammer, and said he was a jolly-jist.
"Geologist she means, Charlotte."
"Of course; but Agnes spells it 'jolly-jist.'"
"Agnes ought to know better. She waited table frequently, and must have
heard the word pronounced. Go on, Charlotte."
He kept on at this feckless work till late in the afternoon, and by
that time he had filled both bags full with odd bits of stone. Joe
said he hadn't often had a harder darrack after sheep at
clipping-time than he had after that old man, carrying his leather
bags. But, however, they got back to our house, and mother gave the
stranger some bread and milk; and after he had taken it, and talked
with father about sheep-farming and such like, he paid Joe his five
shillings like a man, and told him he would give him another five
shillings if he would bring his bags full of stones down to
Skeàl-Hill by nine o'clock in the morning.
"Are you sleepy Sophy?"
"Oh, dear, no! Go on."
Next morning Joe took the bags, and started for Skeàl-Hill. It was
another hot morning; and he hadn't gone far till he began to think
that he was as great a fool as the jolly-jist to carry broken
stones to Skeàl-Hill, when he could find plenty on any road-side
close to the place he was going to. So he shook them out of the
bags, and stepped on a gay bit lighter without them. When he got
near to Skeàl-Hill he found old Abraham Atchisson sitting on a
stool, breaking stones to mend roads with; and Joe asked him if he
could fill his leather bags from his heap. Abraham told Joe to take
them that wasn't broken if he wanted stones; so Joe told him how it
was, and all about it. The old man was like to tottle off his stool
with laughing, and he said, "Joe take good care of thysen'; thou
art over sharp to live very long in this world; fill thy bags, and
make on with thee."
"Don't you remember old Abraham, Sophy? He built the stone dyke at the
lower fold."
"No, I do not remember, I think."
"You are getting sleepy. Shall I stop?"
"No, no; finish the letter."
When Joe got to Skeàl-Hill, the jolly-jist had just got his
breakfast, and they took Joe into the parlor to him. He laughed all
over when Joe went in with the bags, and told him to set them down
in a corner, and asked him if he would have some breakfast. Joe had
had his porridge, but he said he didn't mind; so he told them to
bring in some more coffee and eggs, and ham and toasted bread; and
Joe got such a breakfast as isn't common with him, while the old
gentleman was getting himself ready to go off in a carriage that
was waiting at the door for him. When he came down-stairs he gave
Joe another five shillings, and paid for Joe's breakfast, and for
what he had eaten himself. Then he told him to put the leather bags
beside the driver's feet, and into the carriage he got, and
laughed, and nodded, and away he went; and then Joe heard them say
he was Professor Sedgwick, a great jolly-jist. And Joe thinks it
would be a famous job if father could sell all of the stones on our
fell at five shillings a bagful, and a breakfast at odd times. And
would it not be so, Miss Sandal? But I'm not easy in my mind about
Joe changing the stones; though, as Joe says, one make of stone is
about the same as another.
"Sophia, you are sleepy now."
"Yes, a little. You can finish to-morrow."
Then she laid down the simple letter, and sat very still for a little
while. Her heart was busy. There is a solitary place that girdles our
life into which it is good to enter at the close of every day. There we
may sit still with our own soul, and commune with it; and out of its
peace pass easily into the shadowy kingdom of sleep, and find a little
space of rest prepared. So Charlotte sat in quiet meditation until
Sophia was fathoms deep below the tide of life. Sight, speech, feeling,
where were they gone? Ah! when the door is closed, and the windows
darkened, who can tell what passes in the solemn temple of mortality?
Are we unvisited then? Unfriended? Uncounselled?
"Behold!
The solemn spaces of the night are thronged
By bands of tender dreams, that come and go
Over the land and sea; they glide at will
Through all the dim, strange realms of men asleep,
And visit every soul."