|My dear Theodora:--
You will have received my letters regularly; nor am I much surprised
that they have not been answered. I have heard, from time to time, in
other ways, all particulars of your sister's illness and of you. Mrs.
Granton says you keep up well, but I know that, could I see it now, it
would be the same little pale face which used to come stealing to me
from your father's bedside, last year.
If I ask you to write, my love, believe it is from no doubt of you,
or jealousy of any of your home-duties; but because I am wearying for a
sight of your handwriting, and an assurance from yourself that you are
not failing in health, the only thing in which I have any fear of your
failing.
To answer a passage in your last, which I have hitherto let be, there
was so much besides to write to you about--the passage concerning
friends parting from friends. At first I interpreted it that in your
sadness of spirit and hopelessness of the future, you wished me to sink
back into my old place, and be only your friend. It was then no time to
argue the point, nor would it have made any difference in my letters,
either way; but now let me say two words concerning it.
My child, when a man loves a woman, before he tries to win her, he will
have, if he loves unselfishly and generously, many a doubt concerning
both her and himself. In fact, as I once read somewhere, "When a man
truly loves a woman, he would not marry her upon any account, unless he
was quite certain he was the best person she could possibly marry." But
as soon as she loves him, and he knows it, and is certain that, however
unworthy he may be, or however many faults she may possess--I never told
you you were an angel, did I, little lady?--they have cast their lot
together, chosen one another, as your church says, "for better, for
worse,"--then the face of things is entirely changed. He has his
rights, close and strong as no other human being can have with regard to
her--she has herself given them to him--and if he has any manliness in
him he never will let them go, but hold her fast for ever and ever.
My dear Theodora, I have not the slightest intention of again subsiding
into your friend. I am your lover and your betrothed husband. I will
wait for you any number of years, till you have fulfilled all your
duties, and no earthly rights have power to separate us longer. But in
the meantime I hold fast to _my_ rights. Everything that lover or
future husband can be to you, I must be. And when I see you, for I am
determined to see you at intervals, do not suppose that it will be
a friend's kiss--if there be such a thing--that--But I have said
enough--it is not easy for me to express myself on this wise.
My love, this letter is partly to consult you on a matter which is
somewhat on my mind. With any but you I might hesitate, but I know your
mind almost as I know my own, and can speak to you, as I hope I always
shall--frankly and freely as a husband would to his wife.
About your sister Penelope and her great sorrow I have already written
fully. Of her ultimate recovery, mentally as well as bodily, I have
little doubt: she has in her the foundations of all endurance--a true
upright nature and a religious mind. The first blow over, a certain
little girl whom I know will be to her a saving angel; as she has been
to others I could name. Fear not, therefore--"Fear God, and have no
other fear:" you will bring your sister safe to land.
But, you are aware, Penelope is not the only person who has been
shipwrecked.
I should not intrude this side of the subject at present, did I not feel
it to be in some degree a duty, and one that, from certain information
that has reached me, will not bear deferring. The more so, because my
occupation here ties my own hands so much. You and I do not live for
ourselves, you know--nor indeed wholly for one another. I want you to
help me, Theodora.
In my last, I informed you how the story of Lydia Cartwright came to my
knowledge, and how, beside her father's coffin, I was entreated by her
old mother to find her out, and bring her home if possible. I had then
no idea who the "gentleman" was; but afterwards was led to suspect it
might be a friend of Mr. Charteris. To assure myself, I one day put some
questions to him--point-blank, I believe, for I abhor diplomacy, nor
had I any suspicion of him personally. In the answer, he gave me a
point-blank and insulting denial of any knowledge on the subject.
When the whole truth came out, I was in doubt what to do consistent with
my promise to the poor girl's mother. Finally, I made inquiries; but
heard that the Kensington cottage had been sold up, and the inmates
removed. I then got the address of Sarah Enfield--that is, I
commissioned my old friend, Mrs. Ansdell, to get it, and sent it to Mrs.
Cartwright, without either advice or explanation, except that it was
that of a person who knew Lydia. Are you aware that Lydia has more than
once written to her mother, sometimes enclosing money, saying she was
well and happy, but nothing more?
I this morning heard that the old woman, immediately on receiving my
letter, shut up her cottage, leaving the key with a neighbour, and
disappeared. But she may come back, and not alone; I hope, most
earnestly, it will not be alone. And therefore I write, partly to
prepare you for this chance, that you may contrive to keep your sister
from any unnecessary pain, and also from another reason.
You may not know it,--and it is a hard thing to have to enlighten my
innocent love, but your father is quite right; Lydia's story is by no
means rare, nor is it regarded in the world as we view it. There are
very few--especially among the set to which Mr. Charteris belonged--who
either profess or practice the Christian doctrine, that our bodies also
are the temples of the Holy Spirit,--that a man's life should, be as
pure as a woman's, otherwise no woman, however she may pity, can, or
ought to respect him, or to marry him. This, it appears to me, is the
Christian principle of love and marriage--the only one by which the
one can be made sacred, and the other "honorable to all." I have tried,
invariably, in every way to set this forth; nor do I hesitate to write
of it to my wife that will be--whom it is my blessing to have united
with me in every work which my conscience once compelled as atonement
and my heart now offers in humblest thanksgiving.
But enough of myself.
While this principle, of total purity being essential for both man and
woman, cannot be too sternly upheld, there is also another side to the
subject, analagous to one of which you and I have often spoken. You will
find it in the seventh chapter of Luke and eighth of John: written, I
conclude, to be not only read, but acted up to by all Christians who
desire to have in them "the mind of Christ."
Now, my child, you see what I mean-how the saving command, "_Go and sin
no more_" applies to this-sin also.
You know much more of what Lydia Cartwright used to be than I do; but
it takes long for any one error to corrupt the entire character; and
her remembrance of her mother, as well as her charity to Sarah Enfield,
imply that there must be much good left in the girl still. She is young.
Nor have I heard of her ever falling lower than this once. But she may
fall; since, from what I know of Mr. Charteris's present circumstances,
she must now, with her child, be left completely destitute. It is not
the first similar case, by many, that I have had to do with; but my
love never can have met with the like before. Is she afraid? does she
hesitate to hold out her pure right hand to a poor creature who never
can be an innocent girl again; who also, from the over severity of
Rockmount, may have been let slip a little too readily, and so gone
wrong?
If you do hesitate, say so; it will not be unnatural nor surprising. If
you do not, this is what I want: being myself so placed that though I
feel the thing ought to be done, there seems no way of doing it, except
through you. Should the Cartwrights reappear in the village, persuade
your father not altogether to set his face against them, or have them
expelled the neighbourhood. They must leave--it is essential for your
sister that they should; but the old woman is very poor. Do not have
them driven away in such a manner as will place no alternative between
sin and starvation. Besides, there is the child--how a man can ever
desert his own child!--but I will not enter into that part of
the subject. This a strange "love" letter; but I write it without
hesitation--my love will understand.
You will like to hear something of me; but there is little to tell. The
life of a gaol surgeon is not unlike that of a horse in a mill; and, for
some things, nearly as hopeless; best fitted, perhaps, for the old and
the blind. I have to shut my eyes to so much that I cannot remedy, and
take patiently so much to fight against which would be like knocking
down the Pyramids of Egypt with one's head as a battering-ram, that
sometimes my courage fails.
This great prison is, you know, a model of its kind, on the solitary,
sanitary, and moral improvement system; excellent, no doubt, compared
with that which preceded it. The prisoners are numerous,-and as soon as
many of them get out they take the greatest pains to get in again; such
are the comforts of gaol life contrasted with that outside. Yet they
seem to me often like a herd of brute beasts, fed and stalled by rule
in the manner best to preserve their health, and keep them from injuring
their neighbours; their bodies well looked after, but their souls--they
might scarcely have any! They are simply Nos. 1, 2, 3, and so on, with
nothing of human individuality or responsibility about them. Even their
faces grow to the same pattern, dull, fat, clean, and stolid. During the
exercising hour, I sometimes stand and watch them, each pacing his small
bricked circle, and rarely catch one countenance which has a ray of
expression or intelligence.
Good as many of its results are, I have my doubts as to this solitary
system; but they are expressed on paper in the M.S. you asked for, my
kind little lady! so I will not repeat them here.
Yet it will be a change of thought from your sister's sick-room for you
to think of me in mine--not a sick-room though, thank God! This is a
most healthy region: the sea-wind sweeps round the prison-walls, and
shakes the roses in the governor's garden till one can hardly believe it
is so dreary a place inside. Dreary enough sometimes to make one believe
in that reformer who offered to convert some depraved region into a
perfect Utopia, provided the males above the age of fourteen were all
summarily hanged.
Do you smile, my love, at this compliment to your sex at the expense of
mine? Yet I see wretches here, whom I cannot hardly believe share the
same common womanhood as my Theodora. Think over carefully what I asked
you about Lydia Cartwright; it is seldom suddenly, but step by step,
that this degradation comes. And at every step there is hope; at least,
such is my experience.
Do not suppose, from this description, that I am disheartened at my
work here; besides rules and regulations, there is still much room for
personal influence, especially in hospital. When a man is sick or dying,
unconsciously his heart is humanized--he thinks of God. From this simple
cause, my calling has a great advantage over all others; and it is much
to have physical agencies on one's side, as I do not get them in the
streets and towns. To-day, looking up from a clean, tidy, airy cell,
where the occupant had at least a chance of learning to read if he
chose; and, seeing through the window the patch of bright blue sky,
fresh and pure as ever sky was, I thought of two lines you once repeated
to me out of your dear head, so full of poetry:=
````"God's in His heaven;
`````All's right with the world."=
Yesterday I had a holiday. I took the railway to Treherne Court, wishing
to learn something of Rockmount. You said it was your desire I should
visit your brother-in-law and sister sometimes.
They seemed very happy--so much as to be quite independent of visitors,
but they received me warmly, and I gained tidings of you. They escorted
me back as far as the park-gates, where I left them standing, talking
and laughing together, a very picture of youth and fortune, and handsome
looks; a picture suited to the place, with its grand ancestral trees
branched down to the ground; its green slopes, and its herds of deer
racing about--while the turrets of the magnificent house which they call
"home," shone whitely in the distance.
You see I am taking a leaf out of your book, growing poetical and
descriptive; but this brief contrast to my daily life made the
impression particularly strong.
You need have no anxiety for your youngest sister; she looked in
excellent health and spirits. The late sad events do not seem to have
affected her. She merely observed, "She was glad it was over, she never
liked Francis much. Penelope must come to Treherne Court for change, and
no doubt she would soon make a far better marriage." Her husband said,
"He and his father had been both grieved and annoyed--indeed, Sir.
William had quite disowned his nephew--such ungentlemanly conduct was
a disgrace to the family." And then Treherne spoke about his own
happiness--how his father and Lady Augusta perfectly adored his wife,
and how the hope and pride of the family were-entered in her, with more
to the same purport. Truly this young couple have their cup brimming
over with life and its joys.
My love, good-bye; which means only "God be with thee!" nor in any
way implies "farewell."--Write soon. Your words are, as the Good Book
expresses it, "sweeter than honey and the honey-comb," to me unworthy.
Max Urquhart.
I should add, though you would almost take it for granted, that in all
you do concerning Mrs. Cartwright or her daughter, I wish you to do
nothing without your father's knowledge and consent.