MAIDENHOOD.
It was June again. One summer evening I took the path which led from
the garden to the summit of the hill which rose behind the cottage.
As I pursued my way upward the sun was setting, and at every step I
obtained a broader glimpse of the river, the dark Palisades, and the
bay white with sails. When I reached the summit, the sun was on the
verge of the horizon, and the sky in the west all purple and gold.
Seating myself on the huge rock, which rose on the summit, surrounded
by a circle of grand old trees, I surrendered myself to the quiet
and serenity of the evening hour. The view was altogether beautiful.
Beneath me sloped the broad hills, clad in wheat which already was
changing from emerald to gold. Farther down, my cottage home half
hidden among trees. Then beneath the cottage, the homes of the village
dotting the hills, among which wound the Neprehaun. The broad river
and the wide bay heaving gently in the fading light, and the dark
Palisades rising blackly against the gold and purple sky. A lovelier
view cannot be imagined. And the air was full of summer--scented with
breath of vines and blossoms and new-mown hay. As I surrendered myself
to thoughts which arose unbidden, the first star came tremulously into
view, and the twilight began to deepen into night. I was thinking of my
life--of the past--of the future. A strange vision of the great world,
struggled into dim shape before the eye of my mind.
"A year more, and I will enter the great world!" I ejaculated. A hand
was laid lightly on my shoulder. I started to my feet with a shriek.
"What, Frank, don't you know me?" said a half laughing voice, and I
beheld beside me a youth of some nineteen or twenty years, whose face,
shaded by dark hair, was touched by the last flush of the declining
day. It was Ernest, the only son of the good clergyman. I had not seen
him for three years. In that time, he had grown from boyhood into young
manhood. He sat beside me on the rock, and we talked together as freely
as when we were but little children. Ernest was full of life and hope;
his voice grew deep, his dark eyes large and lustrous, as he spoke of
the prospects of his future.
"In one year, Frank, I will graduate and then,--then,--the great world
lies before me!" His gaze was turned dreamily to the west, and his fine
features drawn in distinct profile against the evening sky.
"And what part, Ernest, will you play in the great world?"
"Father wishes me to enter into the ministry, but,--" and he uttered
a joyous, confident laugh,--"whatever part I play, I know that I will
win!"
He uttered these words in the tone of youth and hope, that has never
been darkened by a shadow, and then turning to me,--
"And you, Frank, what part will you play in the great world?" he said.
"I know not. My career is in the hands of my only parent, who will
come next year to take me hence. My childhood has been wrapped in
mystery; and my future, O, who can foretell the future?"
He gazed at me, for the first time, with an earnest and searching gaze.
His eyes, large and gray, and capable of the most varied expression,
became absent and dreamy.
"You are very beautiful!" he said, as though thinking aloud,--"O, very
beautiful! You will marry rich,--yes,--wealth and position will be
yours at once."
And as the moon, rising over the brow of the hill, poured her light
upon his thoughtful face, he took my hand and said:
"Frank, why is it that certain natures live only in the future or
the past--never in the present? Look at ourselves, for instance.
Yonder among the trees, bathed in the light of the rising moon, lies
the cottage home in which we have passed the happiest, holiest hours
of life. Of that home we are not thinking now--we are only looking
forward to the future--and yet the time will come, when immersed in the
conflict of the world, we will look back to that home, with the same
yearning that one, stretched upon the couch of hopeless disease, looks
forward to his grave!"
His voice was low and solemn--I never forgot his words. We sat for
many minutes in silence. At length without a word, he took my hand,
and we went down the hill together, by the light of the rising moon.
We climbed the stile, passed under the garden boughs, and entered the
cottage, and found the good old man seated in his library among his
books. He raised his eyes as we came in, hand joined in hand, and a
look of undisguised pleasure stole over his face.
"See here, father," said Ernest laughingly, "when I went to college, I
left my little sister in your care. I now return, and discover that my
little sister has disappeared, and left in her place this wild girl,
whom I found wandering to-night among the hills. Don't you think there
is something like a witch in her eyes?"
The old man smiled and laid his hand on my dark hair.
"Would to heaven!" he said, "that she might never leave this quiet
home." And the prayer came from his heart.
Ernest remained with us until fall. Those were happy days. We read,
we talked, we walked, we lived with each other. More like sister and
sister than brother and sister, we wandered arm-in-arm to the brow of
the hill as the rich summer evening came on,--or crossed the river in
early morning, and climbed the winding road that led to the brow of
the Palisades,--or sat, at night, under the trees by the river's bank,
watching the stars as they looked down into the calm water. Sometimes
at night, we sat in the library, and I read while the old man's hand
rested gently on my head and Ernest sat by my side. And often upon the
porch, as the summer night wore on, Ernest and myself sang together
some old familiar hymn, while "Father" listened in quiet delight. Thus
three months passed away, and Ernest left for college.
"Next year, Frank, I graduate," he cried, his thoughtful face flushed
with hope, and his gray eyes full of joyous light--"and then for the
battle with the world!"
He left, and the cottage seemed blank and desolate. The good clergyman
felt his absence most keenly.
"Well, well," he would mutter, "a year is soon round and then Ernest
will be with us again!"
As for myself, I tried my books, my harp, took long walks alone, busied
myself in household cares, but I could not reconcile myself to the
absence of Ernest.
Winter came, and one night a letter arrived from Ernest to his
father, and in that letter one for--Frank! How eagerly I took it from
"father's" hand and hurried to my room,--that room which I remember yet
so vividly, with its window opening on the garden, and the picture of
the Virgin Mary on the snow-white wall. Unmindful of the cold, I sat
down alone and perused the letter, O, how eagerly! It was a letter from
a brother to a sister, and yet beneath the calm current of a brother's
love, there flowed a deeper and a warmer love. How joyously he spoke of
his future, and how strangely he seemed to mingle my name with every
image of that future! I read his letter over and over, and slept with
it upon my bosom; and I dreamed, O! such air-castle dreams, in which
a whole lifetime seemed to pass away, while Ernest and Frank, always
young, always happy, went wandering, hand-in-hand, under skies without
a cloud. But I awoke in fright and terror. It seemed to me that a cold
hand--like the hand of a corpse--was laid upon my bosom, and somehow
I thought that my mother was dead and that it was her hand. I started
up in fright and tears, and lay shuddering until the rising sun shone
gayly through the frosted window-pane.
Another year had nearly passed away.
It was June again, and it was toward evening that I stood upon the
cottage porch watching--not the cloudless sky and glorious river bathed
in the setting sun--but watching earnestly for the sound of a footstep.
Ernest was expected home. He had graduated with all the honors--he
was coming home! How I watched and waited for that welcome step! At
last the wicket-gate was opened, and Ernest's step resounded on the
garden-walk. Concealing myself among the vines which covered one of
the pillars of the porch, I watched him as he approached, determining
to burst upon him in a glad surprise as soon as he reached the steps.
His head was downcast, he walked with slow and thoughtful steps; his
long black hair fell wild and tangled on his shoulders. The joyous
hue of youth on his cheek had been replaced by the pallor of long and
painful thought. The hopeful boy of the last year had been changed into
the moody and ambitious man! As he came on, although my heart swelled
to bursting at sight of him, I felt awed and troubled, and forgot my
original intention of bursting upon him in a merry surprise. He reached
the porch--he ascended the step--and I glided silently from behind the
pillar and confronted him. O, how his face lighted up as he saw me! His
eyes, no longer glassy and abstracted, were radiant with a delight too
deep for words!
"Frank!" he said, and silently pressed my hand.
"Ernest," was all I could reply, and we stood in silence--both
trembling, agitated--and gazing into each other's eyes.
The good Clergyman was happy that evening, as he sat at the supper
table, with Frank on one hand and Ernest on the other. And old Alice
peering at us through her spectacles could not help remarking, "Well,
well, only yesterday children, and now such a handsome _couple_!"