CHAPTER I.

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GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

VOL. XXXVI. June, 1850. No. 6.

Table of Contents

Fiction, Literature and Articles

Dante’s Divina Commedia

Clifdon

The Dawn of the Hundred Days

The First Love of Ada Somers

Traveling a Touchstone

The Poet Cowper

The Lady of the Rock

Shakspeare. Anaylysis of Romeo and Juliet

Bass and Bass Fishing

The Fine Arts

Early English Poets. Poems of Thomas Carew

Review of New Books

Editor’s Table

Poetry and Music

The Gold-Seeker

Bird-Notes

Symbols

Sonnet. To Shirley

Narcissos

To Arcturus

Mary

Evening

The Queen of the Woods

Scene on the Ohio

The Jolly Ride

Ballads of the Campaign in Mexico. No. V.

Jacob’s Ladder

The Smoker

The Maiden’s Complaint Against Love

The Melodies of Many Lands

Transcriber’s Notes can be found at the end of this eBook.

* * * * *

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

VOL. XXXVI. PHILADELPHIA, June, 1850. NO. 6.

* * * * *

DANTE’S DIVINA COMMEDIA.

FROM THE GERMAN OF SCHELLING.

BY HENRY W. LONGFELLOW.

[In the following elaborate specimen of literary criticism there

are many passages which will be very obscure, not to say

unintelligible, to those who are not familiar with the

philosophic phraseology of the Germans. The student of Dante,

however, will find in it many hints and suggestions worthy his

consideration. It cannot be otherwise than interesting to see

two such minds as those of Schelling and Dante brought into

contact; and to hear what the German philosopher has to say of

the Italian poet.]

IN the sanctuary where Religion

“is married to immortal Verse,”

stands Dante as high-priest, and consecrates all modern Art for its

vocation. Not as a solitary poem, but representing the whole class of

the New Poetry, and itself a separate class, stands the “Divine Comedy,”

so entirely unique, that any theory drawn from peculiar forms is quite

inadequate to it;—a world by itself, it demands its own peculiar

theory. The predicate of Divine was given it by its author, because it

treats of theology and things divine; Comedy he called it, after the

simplest notion of this and its opposite kind,—on account of its

fearful beginning and its happy ending, and because the mixed nature of

the poem, whose material is now lofty and now lowly, rendered a mixed

kind of style necessary.

One readily perceives, however, that according to the common notion it

cannot be called Dramatic, because it represents no circumscribed

action. So far as Dante himself may be looked upon as the hero, who

serves only as a thread for the measureless series of visions and

pictures, and remains rather passive than active,—the poem seems to

approach nearer to a Romance; yet this definition does not completely

exhaust it; nor can we call it Epic, in the usual acceptation of the

word, since there is no regular sequence in the events represented. To

look upon it as a Didactic poem is likewise impossible, because it is

written in a far less restricted form and aim, than those of teaching.

It belongs therefore to none of these classes in particular, nor is it

merely a compound of them; but an entirely unique, and as it were

organic mixture of all their elements, not to be reproduced by any

arbitrary rules of art,—an absolute individuality, comparable with

itself alone and with naught else.

The material of the poem, is, in general terms, the express identity of

the Poet’s age;—the interpenetration of the events thereof with the

ideas of Religion, Science and Poetry in the loftiest genius of that

century. Our intention is not to consider it in its immediate reference

to its age; but rather in its universal application and as the archetype

of all modern Poetry.

The necessary law of this poetry, down to the still indefinitely distant

point where the great Epic of modern times, which hitherto has announced

itself only rhapsodically and in broken glimpses, shall present itself

as a perfect whole, is this:—that the individual gives shape and unity

to that portion of the world which is revealed to him, and out of the

materials of his time, its History and its Science, creates his own

Mythology. For as the ancient world is, in general, the world of

classes, so the modern is that of Individuals. In the former the

Universal is in truth the particular, the race acts as an individual; in

the latter, the Individual is the point of departure, and becomes the

Universal. For this reason, in the former all things are permanent and

imperishable: Number likewise is of no account, since the Universal idea

coincides with that of the Individual;—in the latter, constant mutation

is the fixed law; no narrow circle limits its ends, but one which

through Individuality widens itself to infinitude. And since

Universality belongs to the essence of Poetry, it is a necessary

condition that the Individual through the highest peculiarity should

again become universal, and by his complete speciality become again

absolute. Thus through the perfect individuality and uniqueness of his

Poem, Dante is the Creator of modern art, which without this arbitrary

necessity, and necessary arbitrariness, cannot be imagined.

From the very beginning of Greek Poetry, we see it clearly separated

from Science and Philosophy, as in Homer, and this process of separation

continued until the Poets and the Philosophers became the antipodes of

each other. They in vain by allegorical interpretations of the Homeric

Poems sought artificially to create a harmony between the two. In modern

times Science has preceded Poetry and Mythology, which cannot be

Mythology, without being universal and drawing into its circle all the

elements of the then existing culture, Science, Religion and even Art,

and joining in a perfect unity the material not only of the present but

of the past. Into this struggle, (since Art demands something definite

and limited, while the spirit of the world rushes towards the unlimited,

and with ceaseless power sweeps down all barriers,) must the Individual

enter, but with absolute freedom, seek to rescue permanent shapes from

the fluctuations of time, and within arbitrarily assumed forms to give

to the structure of his poem, by its absolute peculiarity, internal

necessity and external universality.

This Dante has done. He had before him, as material, the history of the

present as well as of the Past. He could not elaborate this into a pure

Epos, partly on account of its nature, partly because, in doing this, he

would have excluded other elements of the culture of his time. To its

completeness belonged also the Astronomy, the Theology and Philosophy of

the time. To these he could not give expression in a Didactic poem, for

by so doing he would again have limited himself. Consequently, in order

to make his Poem universal, he was obliged to make it historical. An

invention, entirely uncontrolled, and proceeding from his own

individuality, was necessary, to unite these materials and form them

into an organic whole. To represent the ideas of Philosophy and Theology

in symbols was impossible, for there then existed no symbolic Mythology.

He could quite as little make his Poem purely allegorical, for then

again it could not be historical. It was necessary therefore to make it

an entirely unique mixture of Allegory and History. In the emblematic

poetry of the ancients no clue of this kind was possible. The Individual

only could lay hold of it, and only an uncontrolled invention follow it.

The poem of Dante is not allegorical in the sense that its figures only

signified something else, without having any separate existence

independent of the thing signified. On the other hand, none of them is

independent of the thing signified in such a way as to be at once the

Idea itself and more than an allegory of it. There is therefore in his

Poem an entirely unique mean between Allegory and symbolic-objective

Form. There is no doubt, and the Poet has himself elsewhere declared it,

that Beatrice, for example, is an Allegory, namely, of Theology. So her

companions; so many other characters. But at the same time they count

for themselves, and appear on the scene as historic personages, without

on that account being symbols.

In this respect Dante is archetypal, since he has proclaimed what the

modern poet has to do, in order to embody into a poetic whole, the

entire history and culture of his age—the only mythological material

which lies before him. He must from absolute arbitrariness join together

the allegorical and historical: he must be allegorical, (and he is so,

too, against his will,) because he cannot be symbolical; and he must be

historical because he wishes to be poetical. In this respect his

invention is always peculiar, a world by itself, and altogether

characteristic.

The only German poem of universal plan, unites together in a similar

manner the outermost extremes in the aspirations of the times, by a very

peculiar invention of a subordinate mythology, in the character of

Faust: although in the Aristophanic meaning of the word it may far

better be called a Comedy, and is another and more poetic sense Divine,

than the Poem of Dante.

The energy with which the individual embodies the singular mixture of

the materials which lie before him in his age and his life determines

the measure in which he possesses mythological power. Dante’s personages

possess a kind of eternity from the position in which he places them,

and which is eternal: but not only the actual which he draws from his

own time, as the story of Ugolino and the like, but also what is pure

invention, as the death of Ulysses and his companions, has in the

connection of his poem a real mythological truth.

It would be of but subordinate interest to represent by itself, the

Philosophy, Physics and Astronomy of Dante, since his true peculiarity

lies only in his manner of fusing them with his poetry. The Ptolemaic

system, which to a certain degree is the foundation of his poetic

structure, has already in itself a mythological coloring. If however his

philosophy is to be characterized in general as Aristotelian, we must

not understand by this the pure Peripatetic philosophy, but a peculiar

union of the same with the ideas of the Platonic, then entertained, as

may be proved by many passages of his poem.

We will not dwell upon the power and solidity of separate passages, the

simplicity and endless _naiveté_ of separate pictures, in which he

expresses his philosophical views, as the well known description of the

soul which comes from the hand of God as a little girl “weeping and

laughing in its childish sport,” a guileless soul, which knows nothing,

save that, moved by its joyful Creator, “willingly it turns to that

which gives it pleasure:”—we speak only of the general symbolic form of

the whole, in whose absoluteness, more than in any thing else, the

universal value and immortality of this Poem is recognized.

If the union of Philosophy and Poetry even in their most subordinate

synthesis is understood as making a didactic poem, it becomes necessary,

since the poem must be without any external end and aim, that the

intention (of instructing) should lose itself in it and be changed into

an absoluteness (_in eine Absolutheit verwandelt_), so that the poem may

seem to exist for its own sake. And this is only conceivable, when

Science (considered as a picture of the Universe, and in perfect harmony

therewith, as the most original and beautiful Poetry) is in itself

already poetical. Dante’s Poem is a much higher interpenetration of

Science and Poetry, and so much the more must its form, even in its

freer self-existence, be adapted to the universal type of the world’s

aspect (_Weltanschauung_).

The division of the Universe and the arrangement of the materials

according to the three kingdoms of Hell, Purgatory and Paradise,

independently of the peculiar meaning of these ideas in Christian

theology, are also a general symbolic form, so that one does not see why

under the same form every remarkable age should not have its own Divine

Comedy. As in the Modern Drama the form of five acts is assumed as the

usual one, because every event may be regarded in its Beginning, its

Progress, its Culmination, its _Dénouement_, and its final Consummation,

so this Trichotomy, or threefold division of Dante in the higher

prophetic poetry, which is to be the expression of a whole age, is

conceivable as a general form, which in its filling-up may be infinitely

varied, as by the power of original invention it can always be quickened

into new life. Not alone however as an external form, but as an

emblematical expression of the internal type of all Science and Poetry

is that form eternal and capable of embracing in itself the three great

objects of Science and culture,—Nature, History and Art. Nature, as the

birth of all things, is the eternal Night; and as that unity through

which these are in themselves, it is the aphelion of the universe, the

point of farthest removal from God, the true centre. Life and History,

whose nature is gradual progress, are only a process of clarification, a

transition to an absolute condition. This can nowhere be found save in

Art, which anticipates eternity, is the Paradise of life, and is truly

in the centre.

Dante’s Poem, therefore, viewed from all sides, is not an isolated work

of a particular age, a particular stage of culture; but it is

archetypal, by the universal interest which it unites with the most

absolute Individuality,—by its universality, in virtue of which it

excludes no side of life and culture,—and finally by its form, which is

not a peculiar type, but the type of the theory of the Universe, in

general.

The peculiar internal arrangement of the Poem certainly cannot possess

this universal interest, since it is formed upon the ideas of the time,

and the peculiar views of the poet. On the other hand, as is to be

expected from a work so artistic and full of purpose, the general inner

type is again externally imaged forth, through the form, color, sound of

the three great Divisions of the Poem.

From the extraordinary nature of his material, Dante needed for the form

of his creations in detail, some kind of credentials which only the

Science of his time could give, and which for him are, so to speak, the

Mythology and the general basis, which supports the daring edifice of

his inventions. But even in the details he remains trite to his design

of being allegorical, without ceasing to be historical and poetical.

Hell, Purgatory and Paradise are, as it were, only his system of

Theology in its concrete and architectural development. The proportion,

number and relations which he observes in their internal structure were

prescribed by this science, and herein he renounced intentionally the

freedom of invention, in order to give, by means of form, necessity and

limitation to his poem, which in its materials was unlimited. The

universal sanctity and significancy of numbers is another external form

upon which his poetry rests. So in general the entire logical and

syllogistic lore of that age, is for him only form, which must be

granted to him, in order to attain to that region in which his poetry

moves.

And yet in this adherence to religious and philosophical notions, as the

most universally interesting thing which his age offered, Dante never

seeks an ordinary kind of poetic probability; but rather renounces all

intention of flattering the baser senses. His first entrance into Hell

takes place, as it should take place, without any unpoetical attempt to

assign a motive for it or to make it intelligible, in a condition like

that of a Vision, without however any intention of making it appear

such. His being drawn up by Beatrice’s eyes, through which the divine

power is communicated to him, he expresses in a single line: what is

wonderful in his own adventures he immediately changes to a likeness of

the mysteries of religion, and gives it credibility by a yet higher

mystery, as when he makes his entrance into the moon, which he compares

to that of light into the unbroken surface of water, an image of God’s

incarnation.

To show the perfection of art, and the depth of purpose which was

carried even into the minor details of the inner structure of the three

worlds, would be a science in itself. This was recognized shortly after

the poet’s death by his nation, in their appointing a distinct

Lectureship upon Dante, which was first filled by Boccaccio.

But not only do the several incidents in each of the three parts of the

Poem allow the universal character of the first form to shine through

them, but the law thereof expresses itself yet more definitely in the

inner and spiritual rhythm, by which they are contradistinguished from

each other. The Inferno, as it is the most fearful in its objects, is

likewise the strongest in expression, the severest in diction, and in

its very words dark and awful. In one portion of the Purgatorio deep

silence reigns, for the lamentations of the lower world grow mute: upon

its summits, the forecourts of Heaven, all becomes Color: the Paradiso

is the true music of the spheres.

The variety and difference of the punishments in the Inferno are

conceived with almost unexampled invention. Between the crime and the

punishment there is never any other than a poetic relation. Dante’s

spirit is not daunted by what is terrible; nay, he goes to its extreme

limits. But it could be shown in every case, that he never ceases to be

sublime and in consequence truly beautiful. For that which men, who are

not capable of comprehending the whole, have sometimes pointed out as

low, is not so in their sense of the term, but is a necessary element of

the mixed nature of the Poem, on account of which Dante himself called

it a Comedy. The hatred of evil, the scorn of a godlike spirit, which

are expressed in Dante’s fearful composition, are not the inheritance of

common souls. It is indeed very doubtful still, though quite generally

believed, whether his banishment from Florence, after he had previously

dedicated his Poetry to Love, first spurred on his spirit, naturally

inclined to whatever was earnest and extraordinary, to the highest

Invention, in which he breathed forth the whole of his life, of the

destiny of his heart and of his country, together with his indignation

thereat. But the vengeance which he takes in the Inferno, he takes in

the name of the Day of Judgment, as the elected Judge with prophetic

power, not from personal hate, but with a pious soul roused by the

abominations of the times, and a love of his native land long dead in

others, as he has himself represented in a passage in the Paradiso where

he says

“If e’er it happen that the Poem sacred

To which both Earth and Heaven have lent their hand,

Till it hath made me meagre many a year,

Conquer the cruelty that shuts me out

Of the fair sheep-fold, where a lamb I slumbered,

An enemy to the wolves that war upon it,

With other voice forthwith, with other fleece

The Poet shall return, and at the font

Baptismal, shall he take the crown of laurel.”

He tempers the horror of the torments of the damned, by his own feeling

for them, which at the end of so much suffering so overwhelms him that

he is ready to weep, and Virgil says to him “Wherefore then art thou

troubled?”

It has already been remarked that the greater part of the punishments of

the Inferno are symbolical of the crimes for which they are inflicted,

but many of them are so in a far more general relation. Of this kind is,

in particular, the representation of a metamorphosis, in which two

natures are mutually interchanged and their substance transmuted. No

metamorphosis of Antiquity can compare with this for invention, and if a

naturalist or a didactic poet were able to sketch with such power,

emblems of the eternal metamorphoses of nature, he might congratulate

himself upon it.

As we have already remarked, the Inferno is not only distinguished from

the other parts by the external form of its representation, but also by

the circumstance that it is peculiarly the realm of forms and

consequently the plastic part of the Poem. The Purgatorio must be

recognized as the picturesque part. Not only are the penances here

imposed upon sinners at times pictorially treated even to brightness of

coloring; but the journey up the holy mountain of Purgatory presents in

detail a rapid succession of shifting landscapes, scenes and manifold

play of light; until upon its outermost boundary, when the Poet has

reached the waters of Lethe, the highest pomp of Painting and Color

displays itself;—in the picturing of the divine primeval forest of this

region, of the celestial clearness of the water, overcast with its

eternal shadow, of the maiden whom he meets upon its banks and the

descent of Beatrice in a cloud of flowers, beneath a white veil, crowned

with olive, wrapped in a green mantle, and “vested in colors of the

living flame.”

The Poet has urged his way to light through the very heart of the earth:

in the darkness of the lower world forms alone could be distinguished:

in Purgatory light is kindled, but still in connection with earthly

matter and becomes color. In Paradise there remains nothing but the pure

music of the light; reflection ceases, and the Poet rises gradually to

behold the colorless pure essence of Deity itself.

The astronomical system which the age of the poet invested with a

mythological value; the nature of the stars and of the measure of their

motion, are the ground upon which his inventions, in this part of the

poem, rest. And if he in this sphere of the unconditioned, still suffers

degrees and differences to exist, he again removes them by the glorious

word which he puts into the mouth of one of the sister-souls whom he

meets in the moon, that “every _Where_ in heaven is Paradise.”

The plan of the Poem renders it natural that on the very ascent through

Paradise the loftiest speculations of Theology should be discussed. His

deep reverence for this science is symbolized by his love of Beatrice.

In proportion as the field of vision enlarges itself into the purely

Universal, it is necessary that Poetry should become Music, form vanish,

and that, in this point of view, the Inferno should appear the most

poetic part of the work. But in this work it is absolutely impossible to

take things separately; and the peculiar excellence of each separate

part is authenticated and recognized only through its harmony with the

whole. If the relation of the three parts to the whole is perceived, we

shall necessarily recognize the Paradiso as the purely musical and

lyrical portion, even in the design of the poet, who expresses this in

the external form, by the frequent use of the Latin words of Church

Hymns.

The marvelous grandeur of the Poem, which gleams forth in the mingling

of all the elements of poetry and art, reaches in this way a perfect

manifestation. This divine work is not plastic, not picturesque, not

musical, but all of these at once and in accordant harmony. It is not

dramatic, not epic, not lyric, but a peculiar, unique, and unexampled

mingling of all these.

I think I have shown, at the same time, that it is prophetic, and

typical of all the Modern Poetry. It embraces all its characteristics,

and springs out of the intricately mingled materials of the same, as the

first growth, stretching itself above the earth and toward the

heavens—the first fruit of transfiguration. Those who would become

acquainted with the poetry of modern times, not superficially, but at

its fountain head, may train themselves by this great and mighty spirit,

in order to know by what means the whole of the modern time may be

embraced in its entireness, and that it is not held together by a

loosely woven band. They who have no vocation for this, can apply to

themselves the words at the beginning of the first part:

“Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch’ entrate.”

* * * * *

THE GOLD-SEEKER.

BY GRACE GREENWOOD.

’TWAS upon a southern desert, and beneath a burning sky,

That a pilgrim to the gold-clime sunk, o’erwearied, down to die!

He was young, and fair, and slender, but he bore a gallant heart—

Through the march so long and toilsome he had bravely held his part.

His companions round him gathered, with kind word and pitying look,

As in fever-thirst he panted, like “the hart for the water brook;”

While their last cool drops outpouring on his brow and parched lips,

Sorrowed they to mark his glances growing dim with death’s eclipse.

Turning then, and onward passing, left they there the dying man,

For a weary way to westward still the promised river ran.

One there was, a comrade faithful, who the longest lingered there,

While he wrung his hand in parting, bidding him not yet despair;

For they would return at morning, from the river banks, he said—

And a silken scarf unfolding, laid it o’er the sufferer’s head—

Then full often backward glancing, took the weary march again,

Onward pressing toward the waters, gleaming far across the plain.

Silent lies the one forsaken, in this hour of pain and fear,

While their farewells and their footsteps die upon his failing ear;

With the withered turf his death-couch, ’neath the burning heat of

day,

All unhearing and unheeding, for his soul is far away!

In the dear home of his childhood, in a pleasant northern land,

He beholds about him smiling the familiar household band;

Sees, perchance, his father coming homeward, through the twilight

gray—

Listens to his merry brothers, laughing in their childish play—

Feels the fond arms of his mother, as of old, about him thrown,

And the fair cheek of his sister pressing soft against his own!

Or he strays amid the moonlight, in a cool and shadowy grove,

Looking down with earnest glances into eyes that look back love!

All beloved tones are calling sweetly through his heart again,

And its dying pulse is quickened by the phantoms of his brain!

And belovéd names he murmurs, while his bosom heaves and swells,

For in dreams again he liveth through his partings and farewells!

Slowly sinks the sun—night’s shadows round the lonely pilgrim spread—

While the rising night-winds gently lift the light scarf from his

head,

And the soft and pitying moonbeams glance upon his forehead fair,

And the dews of night descending damp the dark locks of his hair;

Cool upon his brow they’re falling—but its fever-throbs are o’er—

And his parched lips they moisten, but those lips shall thirst no

more!

His companions come at morning—come to look on his dead face,

Come to lay him to his grave-rest, in that dreary desert place;

Where the tropic sun glares fiercely on the wide, unsheltered plain,

And where pour, from darkest heavens, rushing floods of winter rain!

Where shall come the wild-bird’s screaming, and the whirlwind’s

sounding sweep,

And the tramp of herded bisons shall go thundering o’er his sleep.

There are piteous sounds of mourning in a far off northern home,

Where o’er childhood’s kindling dawn-light sudden clouds of darkness

come—

There are heard a father’s groanings, and a mother’s broken sighs—

There a voiceless sorrow troubleth the clear deeps of maiden eyes.

In their fearful dreams, at midnight, they behold him left to die,

With the hard, hot ground beneath him, and above a brazen sky—

In his fainting, in his thirsting, in his pain and wild despair,

Vainly calling on his dear ones, through the heavy desert-air!

Oh, the bitter self-reproaches mingled in the cup they drain!

Oh, their poor hearts, pierced and tortured by a sharp, remorseful

pain—

That they sent their best and dearest from his home-love’s sheltering

fold,

In the madness of adventure, on that pilgrimage of gold.

* * * * *

CLIFDON.

BY ANNE DRINKER.

CHAPTER I.

“FATHER! my father! in mercy!”

“Curse you!”

“My God!”

“Ay, curse you. For have you not turned to poison the life whose

blessing you were? Have you not dragged down my pride to the depths of

shame? Have you not made your father’s name a by-word for the lips of

the idle? Then curse you, Mabel Clifdon.”

And Philip Mordaunt paused, exhausted by his own violence; paused, with

lips trembling, with the hot blood mounting even to the white hairs

brushed from his massive forehead, with his strong form shattered as a

reed by the tempest of passion.

“Has not my agony washed out the blot of my transgression? Do I not

grovel at your feet, not for the aid I dare not hope, but for the pardon

God gives the vilest? Have I not suffered till my life has been to me a

torture and a curse, and a long remorse? Is it not enough, my father?”

“May your lips wither when you speak the word, ‘Father.’ Out upon you!”

“Merciful God!”

“Away! away! Out of the home you have forsaken! Away from the threshold

you pollute! May the memory of the mother murdered by your ingratitude,

of the childless and wifeless old man whose love you have turned to

hate, ever cling around your heart; ever poison, like a million of

curses, the well-spring of your life! away!”

But she lay there, buried in the long folds of her hair, the raven

masses that he had so often smoothed and played with, lay there like a

thing without sense or motion, save for the prolonged and bitter sobs

that burst forth at intervals, as though the very heart was cleft

asunder and breathing out its life.

And before her stood the stern old man, with his arms crossed upon his

broad chest, his pale lip compressed, and rigid as though cast in iron,

and his eye turned immovably on that prostrate form.

Around him were the evidences of his wealth. The marble fountain that

tossed its white spray, and rang forth its silver peel amid the rare and

tropical plants, whose perfume stole through the open blinds of the

conservatory; the rich drapery of the massive windows; the crimson of

the gilded and carved coaches; the deep and glowing dyes of the thick

carpets; the soft light of the crystal lamp that swung to and fro from

the frescoed ceiling, and the only child of the rich man crouched amid

the luxuries that had once been hers, in her mean and faded garb, dusty

and toil-worn, unmantled, save for the dark glory of those redundant

tresses.

Philip Mordaunt gazed, and for a moment his brow relaxed, and his voice

softened as he spoke again,

“Mabel.”

Eagerly she looked up; eagerly upon his stern care-worn face those wild

eyes turned, with a half hopeful, half doubting expression, that might

have softened a harder heart; but his was steeled against her.

“When you left my home and heart for a villain, I cursed you, Mabel

Clifdon. But I will unsay my curse; I will drag you from the shame into

which you have fallen. See, my arms are opened to receive you.”

“But Clifdon,” she murmured gaspingly, still crouching to the earth.

“Perdition seize him!”

She shuddered but spoke not.

“See,” murmured the old man, raising her slight form from the ground and

speaking kindly, but with a strange gleam in his eye, that mocked the

softness of his tones, “See how I woo you back again. I press you to my

heart; I smooth back these bright waves that I may kiss your cheek and

forehead as I did of old. Come back to the lone old man, who is dying in

the midst of his luxury, and all for lack of one dear heart to lean

upon. Sweet Mabel! darling! my own, my only child! hark how your mother

from her grave implores you. Return, forsake the villain who has wrought

us all this anguish.”

“Ah! no! no!”

“Then perish!” he said fiercely, dashing her violently to the earth, “Go

perish, fool, with all that you would cling to!”

Again she lay prostrate and half insensible, but with her breath coming

in short quick gasps, and the large tears working their way slowly and

painfully from beneath the broad white lids that closed above them.

For some minutes Mordaunt paced the room with rapid and impatient steps;

now, with a glance turned upon that shaken form, now, lost in thought.

Suddenly he paused, and that same cruel smile played within his cold

blue eye, though the lines about his mouth softened and his voice was

calm.

“You refuse to give me the surest evidence of your repentance,” he said.

“Prayers, tears, promises—empty air! I sicken of them. Yet, another

proof of your truth remains. You have a child, a son—,” he paused.

With a low cry she sprung to her feet, and stood gazing at him, with

lips slightly parted, and head bent forward in silent eagerness.

“I will rescue him from yon den of vice and pollution. I will take him

to my bosom as I would have taken the mother who bore him. But that

mother he must never know. Swear that his name shall never pass your

lips; swear that he shall be to you as the child of a stranger; that

your eyes shall never rest again upon his face. Swear this, and even he,

even the fruit of your transgression shall be forgiven.” He paused, and

bent his gaze upon her, as the torturer may look upon the victim whose

agonies his malice would prolong.

But she sprung to his feet, and, kneeling there, pressed her eager and

passionate kisses rapidly upon his garment, his hands, nay, even upon

the hem of his furred and silken robe.

“Said I in my heart that you were cruel? Take him, my beautiful, my

bright boy! Take him now in his purity! Wo! that guilt should reach him

even on his mother’s bosom! Take him, and I will bless you though you

trample me to the earth! I will pray for you as never lip prayed, though

your every word be a scorning and a curse. Speak those dear words again!

Say, ere my brain fails, that they deceived me not.”

He stood looking down upon her with a surprised and troubled expression.

“Do you yield him so readily?”

“Ay, and thank Heaven that I may.”

“Remember! never to reclaim him. Never to hear him call you mother;

never to look upon his baby face or to feel the clinging of his arms,

and the pressure of his lips upon yours.”

“In mercy—in mercy—ah! spare me!”

He was touched, even he, the cruel and unforgiving, by the helpless

agony of that clinging form, those faint and gasping words, but he was

silent, and an expression of doubt and irresolution crossed his face.

His offer, cold and cruel as it was, had been made in scorn, and he was

unprepared for acceptance. At last he spoke.

“Send the boy to me,” he said, pointing at the same time to the door.

“Send him, but look that you cross no more his path or mine. Go!” and as

he motioned her imperiously away, the suppliant arose and gathering up

again her long tresses, and shrouding her face beneath her hood,

departed, with the red spot burning on her cheek, and the smile of the

martyred within her eye and upon her lip.

“It is Mrs. Clifdon, pretty Mrs. Clifdon,” said one of a group of

gentlemen gathered near, as she passed down the marble steps and left

forever the door now closed upon her.

“What takes her to Mordaunt’s?” inquired another, staring after her with

a rude curiosity, that quickened her steps and made her heart beat with

apprehension.

“Don’t you remember? It is an old story. The disinherited child of

Philip Mordaunt, who ran off with a circus-rider some four or five years

ago. Clifdon, you know, handsome Ned Clifdon.”

“And has never been forgiven?”

“By yon piece of breathing marble? Never. And she was but a giddy

spoiled child, too, at the time; only sixteen, more to be pitied than

blamed, poor thing.”

On she hurried, with faltering steps; avoiding the bright and crowded

thoroughfares, to seek the more gloomy and deserted streets; thus, until

she paused before a large and gayly ornamented building and opening a

side-door, entered, and closed it behind her. Passing up the dark and

winding stair-case with a hasty tread, she paused, breathless, before a

small room, and through its half open door stood for a few minutes

gazing silently.

It was a strange scene that she looked upon. The apartment, with its

dusky walls and discolored floor, the rude form made to serve the

purpose of a chair, the rough table, upon which flared the dim and

misshapen lamp—all seemed to speak the abode of neglect and poverty.

But tossed upon the floor, the table, and upon the form beside the

cracked mirror, lay white and crimson plumes, mock jewels, that flashed

with a false glitter beneath the lamp-light, gaudy and bespangled

dresses, and lastly, the figure of the actor arrayed in his fanciful yet

not unbecoming attire.

He was tall, yet somewhat lightly built, and the close jacket of blue

and silver, with its fringed and spangled tunic, the buck-skin fitted

tightly around his lower limbs, the sandals donned in lieu of the heavy

boot, and laced around the slender and well-turned ankle, exhibited to

the utmost advantage a wonderful union of strength and beauty. A

light-blue cap, with its waving plumes and sparkling ornaments, lay upon

the table beside him, but his head was uncovered, and over the hands,

upon which his face was bowed, fell the raven and glossy curls, in

almost feminine profusion.

“Ned!”

He started to his feet, and clasped in his own the little hand that had

fallen so tremulously upon his shoulder.

“Dear Mabel!”

She smiled in his face and strove to speak, but in vain, and bowing her

face upon the hand she held, she wept, long and bitterly.

He looked upon her with a changing countenance, now with an expression

of strange, half-womanish tenderness within his deep-blue eye, now, with

the deadly white of agony settling around his lips, and the sharp glance

of fear wandering to the door and out, as though it would penetrate the

dark, still, passage, and when he spoke it was in a voice tremulous with

emotion.

“Speak Mabel. Did you succeed? Is there hope left? For God’s sake

speak!” and clinging to his arm for support, she did speak, briefly,

rapidly, as though every word were a pang she sought to spare him.

He listened to the whole in silence, with his eyes fixed upon her

colorless face.

“I looked for nothing more,” he said at last. “Hope did not delay me.”

“Delay you, Edward.”

“I mean that I never built upon it,” he said hurriedly, and averting his

eyes, “I meant but that.”

She looked upon him with a troubled face, as he paced the floor of the

little apartment, and spoke again, but hesitatingly.

“You will give up the boy, Edward?”

“I have no right to give him a prison roof when a better offers,” said

Clifdon bitterly. “He has the Mordaunt face, and more of the Mordaunt

blood than mine. Ay, send him, he might curse me for the love that would

keep him.”

“Hush! hush! dearest: never talk so wildly. I will go to Brendon, I will

kneel again and pray for mercy, for delay. I will walk the very streets

a beggar till the debt is paid. Only speak not so. Is there not hope?”

He tossed back the bright dark hair as though an insufferable weight

were pressing upon his temples, and flinging open a window, leaned out

and gasped for breath. When he again drew back his face was calm, but

his voice sounded with unnatural hollowness.

“If Mark Brendon sees to-morrow’s light, Mabel, your husband lies in a

debtor’s prison, without the means to work for his freedom. And he will

be there forever.”

“Not so, Clifdon, I shall be alone—” her voice faltered despite her

efforts, “unburthened, and I can work.”

“_You_,” he said, abruptly pausing before her; and taking in his own her

white, small hands, he gazed upon them with a smile of bitter mockery.

“You would have starved—you would starve, Mabel, without a friend or a

hope in this wide world. You would die unheeded at the threshold of him

you have forsaken for—your husband.”

She shuddered; not at his words, but at the strange expression within

his eye and upon his lip.

“When I took you from your palace-home, Mabel, it was with the love of a

man young in the world, and young in sorrow. Now would I give my right

hand to place you there again. To part from you Mabel, never more to

look upon your face, or to rest upon your bosom and listen to your sweet

voice, when my head is throbbing with the weariness and tumult of yon

accursed buffoonery. Will you leave me? I bid you go.”

“Leave you?”

“Hark, Mabel, hark! Suppose the hand you clasp and wet with your tears,

were double dyed in guilt; that it were red even with the blood of

murder, (ay, shudder and grow pale and blench away!) If I told you this,

that I was a demon walking hand in hand through earth with an angel,

that I had sinned too deeply even to meet your eye or to hear your

voice, would I drive you from me?”

“If I could believe.”

“You would cling to me in sorrow, but not in guilt, Mabel,” he said,

regarding her with a look of jealous suspicion.

“Through the darkest deeps of shame and misery. I will forsake thee only

with death! Yet, oh! my husband, wherefore torture me thus?”

“Because I would drive you from me,” he said, with violence the more

exaggerated because unreal; “Go, woman, I love you not! Go! back to your

home! Away from one you burthen and weary!”

She looked at him for an instant doubtingly, but his brows were gathered

into a heavy frown, and his eyes from beneath their long lashes flashed

fire upon her. With a low moan she sunk fainting at his feet.

“I have done my duty,” he murmured, as he raised her tenderly in his

arms and kissed, again and again, her damp cheek and forehead, “she

would not leave me—God is my witness there. Dear Mabel! my own sweet

wife! hark how I unsay those cruel words.”

She replied not, but raised her eyes to his, and in that one look of

unutterable affection he read how futile had been his effort, how mighty

a thing is love.

A bell rang below, and at the same moment a footstep was heard in the

passage, and a child sprung into the room, and to Mabel’s side.

“I must go,” said Clifdon, starting. “Lock the door, and remain here

until I return to take you home. Phil, stay with your mother.”

“Let _me_ go,” said the boy, pressing to his side, and playing with the

silver fringe of his tunic. “Let me see you ride White Fleeta once more

around the ring—only once. Ah, mamma, it is so beautiful!”

“No, no!” said Clifdon, impatiently. “It is no place for you. Come,

come, I must go.”

“Bring me down, then, where Mark is on the swing,” persisted the little

one, coaxingly. “Let me see Mark swing.”

A dark cloud swept over his father’s face, and extricating his dress

with a smothered imprecation, he turned toward the door.

“Lend me your knife, then,” said Philip, springing forward and again

grasping his dress; and throwing it hastily to the petitioner, Clifdon

hurried down stairs.

He flung open the door of an apartment in the lower passage, and

striding through without a glance at the gayly-bedizened throng there

assembled, led forward a powerful white mare that stood saddled and

bridled, and appeared to busy himself with its glittering trappings.

“How now, Captain Ned, gallant Captain Ned,” said one, advancing from

the group with a jeering smile and a grotesque bow. “I looked to White

Fleeta myself, and you are pulling to pieces my work without mercy.”

“Her throat-latch is too tight,” said Clifdon, bending over the animal

till the long plumes of his cap swept its glossy mane.

But the clown, for such was the post the first speaker held in the

company, pressed yet closer, and attempted to touch the small ears that

were now laid angrily back.

“You fret her,” said Clifdon, impatiently; “stand aside.”

The man winced in affected terror, and springing back, crouched, panting

and fanning himself with his large hat, twisting his features meanwhile

into a grimace that elicited shouts of laughter from his companions.

Placed above the mass of his profession by education, and somewhat by

birth, Clifdon was, of course, to many, an object of jealousy; and

although none dared to come forward singly, all willingly encouraged and

sided with their comrade.

“We look sad to-night, gallant Captain Ned,” he said, advancing again

with an affected shuffle and a sidelong movement. “Are we in love, or in

debt; or has the pretty bird that we lock up so carefully flown off to a

golden cage?”

“Peace,” said Clifdon, turning toward his tormentor with so black a

frown that he started and changed countenance. “Peace, fool!”

“You have given me my title,” said the other, with a mock bow and a

smile where rage and malice badly counterfeited mirth. “_I_ am not

ashamed of my profession, handsome Captain Ned.”

“Come, come,” said a third, advancing slowly, “stand back Tom,” to the

clown, “the captain and I have some business matters to arrange.”

“Ay, ay,” said the person addressed, with a significant wink; and

crossing the room by a succession of somersets, he disappeared through

the opposite door.

The last comer was a short and slightly-built man, clad from head to

foot in buck-skin, save for the scarlet and gold garment that girded

around his waist, was fastened at each knee by a garter and clasp of

some brilliant material. His hair, instead of flowing in the long, loose

curls affected by most of his companions, had been shorn close to the

head, leaving exposed the low and sensual formation of the forehead, and

the large ears, that, flapping and shapeless, hung forward like those of

an animal. The flat nose, the high cheek-bones; the thick and habitually

up-curved lips, the small, gray eye lurking beneath its over-hanging

brow, and, above all, the extraordinary length of the arms, gave to this

remarkable person more the appearance of a species of the monkey tribe

than of a human being.

“The money, Ned; I swear I will wait no longer.”

“To-morrow,” said Clifdon, hoarsely, and bending as if to tighten the

saddle-girth.

“On your word?” repeated Brendon, for it was he, with a glance of

incredulity.

“Ay—begone!”

The other turned upon his heel with a prolonged whistle, and Clifdon,

vaulting into the saddle, awaited the signal for his appearance.

CHAPTER II.

Once, twice, thrice around the ring on the flying steed, with foot

scarce resting on the gilded saddle, and hand from which the silken rein

hung slack and unguiding. And with clapping and shouts of admiration the

people hailed their favorite, who bowed, and raised his plumed cap, and

smiled as though no breath of care or passion had ever dimmed the lustre

of his sparkling beauty.

Again, again around the ring, and with a bound over the light barrier,

White Fleeta and her rider disappeared amid the vociferous plaudits of

the crowd; and springing from the saddle, Clifdon flung himself upon a

chair, panting and exhausted, with his lips working, and his hands

clasped upon his closed eyes.

A laugh at some gay witticism, and a roar of applause from the multitude

as Mark Brendon entered. Clifdon started from his seat, and partially

drawing the red curtain, stood and looked out quivering, and yet gazing

as if fixed by some horrid fascination.

At some distance from the ground, and secured by strong iron hooks to

the ceiling hung a thick rope-swing, into which, mounting on his

companion’s shoulders, Brendon was about to vault. When, supported by

the herculean strength of the clown, he shook it, as if to prove the

fidelity of that to which his life was to be intrusted, the form of that

unseen watcher swayed like a reed, and the moisture gathered and rolled

in thick drops from his brow and lip.

A vault, a shout from the crowd, and Brendon was fixed securely in the

swing, that already moved slowly to and fro. And with eyes of horrible

eagerness, with grinding teeth, and hands so madly clinched that the

nails, unheeded, were driven into the flesh, Clifdon bent forward his

head and gazed.

It was as though a species of insanity possessed him.

Lazily the rope swung to and fro.

Suddenly its motion quickened. Then faster and faster, until with

frightful velocity the swinger dashed from the opposite extremities of

the room with a force that brought him almost in contact with the lofty

ceiling. Stimulated alternately by the deafening plaudits, the silent

terror of the gazers, his efforts became each moment more tremendous.

Now he swung, supported only by one clinging hand; now suddenly

suspended by his feet, while a shriek of horror mimicked by the grinning

clown, rang from some quarter of the wide apartment.

“Frightful!” exclaimed a bystander.

And as she spoke, with the hideous speed of a ball dashed from the

cannon’s mouth, the body of the actor was hurled, once against the

gilded chandelier, once against the painted walls of the saloon, and

then, with a dull rebound to the earth, where it lay still and

breathless, while the rope to which it yet hung fell, severed, beside

it.

No one spoke, no one moved. Each seemed transfixed with unutterable

horror. Then from the awful silence, as if to break its spell, arose a

shriek, shrill and piercing.

And leaping hurriedly from the boxes, and over the surrounding barriers,

with exclamations and bursts of smothered horror, the multitude pressed

around the prostrate form.

They raised it and looked upon it. A ghastly sight! From the glaring and

upturned eye; from the distorted form, life seemed to have departed; but

through the blue lips oozed slowly a purple foam, and across the brow a

single vein grew black and knotted, and worked like a reptile in its

death-agony.

“It is all over,” whispered a bystander, as even this lothesome motion

ceased; and his words were passed from mouth to mouth in murmurs that

scarcely broke the silence into which the crowd again had hushed.

There, from his lurking place, still gazed the husband of Mabel Clifdon;

but his form no longer swayed and quivered, and his face was like

marble. Only from beneath his bent brows shot a strange and terrible

fire.

It was as though a demon had entered the sculptured form of an angel,

and concealed beneath its beauty, betrayed only through the insensible

eyes, the baleful hideousness of his presence.

The crowd began to disperse, at first singly, and then in whispering

groups, but he stirred not; some one even shouted his name, but he stood

without the power to move.

Something brushed against his shoulder, and a low neigh sounded

thrillingly in his ear. He turned, and with her large, dark, half human

eyes fixed upon him, White Fleeta stood beside her master.

It seemed as if that gentle and tender gaze had suddenly broken the

fearful spell that bound him, for flinging himself to the earth with a

burst of passion, Clifdon lay there, convulsed and agonized, while the

animal that his hands had ever fed, and that loved him as it is in the

nature of its generous kind to love, knelt by his side, and with a soft

moan, rubbed her glossy head against his shoulder.

Again his name was shouted, and springing to his feet, he stood for a

few minutes struggling with mighty efforts to regain his composure; and

then, deadly pale, but calm, drew back the curtain, and once more

entered the saloon.

The crowd had utterly dispersed, but the body of the dead man had been

stretched upon a form which several of the company were bearing to the

door.

“Lend us a hand, Clifdon,” said the voice that had before summoned him,

“you are the strongest of us.”

“Not I,” said Clifdon, turning away to conceal the spasm that distorted

his features. “I saw the whole—I am shaken with horror.”

There was something in his voice that silenced them, for, without

further remonstrance, they passed on, leaving him standing alone with

the clown.

“It is horrible!” said Clifdon, in a low tone, and with a shudder.

“Horrible!” echoed the jester. Then, after a pause, raising his eyes

with a steady gaze, he continued. “The rope broke, it seems. This strong

rope—incredible!”

The other replied not.

“You are freed from your debt, Captain Ned,” resumed the clown, playing

carelessly, as he spoke, with the broken rope. “You are safe now.”

“Name it not,” said Clifdon hoarsely, and turning away.

An exclamation from his companion called him back.

“It is strange,” said the clown intently examining the ragged piece of

rope. “Here is a drop of blood—a single drop of blood; just where it

was broken off near the ceiling. How came it here?”

“It fell from the body,” whispered Clifdon.

“The body did not bleed, except at the mouth, where the blood was mixed

with froth, and could not leave so dark a stain.”

“You are swelling a trifle into importance,” said Clifdon, impatiently.

“The spot may be accounted for in a thousand ways; it may not even be

blood.”

His companion did not reply, but threw aside the rope as if convinced.

Suddenly he stooped and raised from the ground some glittering substance

that had apparently fallen from it.

“What is it?” asked Clifdon.

“Nothing; a silver fringe, or a spangle, I believe,” said the other,

calmly. Then, with a rapid glance, “You have cut your finger, gallant

Captain Ned.”

“A trifle,” said Clifdon, hastily, but coloring as he spoke. “I cut it

with some of White Fleeta’s showy trappings, and it bleeds afresh.” And

turning upon his heel, he strode from the saloon.

CHAPTER III.

Fifteen years had elapsed since the occurrence of the incidents recorded

in my last chapter, when a company of circus-riders took up their abode

for the night in a village of one of our northern states. It was late in

the autumn, and after having satisfactorily disposed of their baggage

and horses, most of the travelers were glad to find refuge in the

spacious bar-room of the village tavern, where the blaze that roared and

crackled up the wide chimney, seemed in its cheerfulness almost a

sufficient recompense for the day’s journey. Chilled by the evening air,

wearied by their dreary march, and little inclined at any time to be

regardful of ceremony, each of the party had chosen the position most

conducive to his own comfort; and while some occupied the settees and

arm-chairs dispersed around the apartment, their companions stretched

themselves upon the floor and round the glowing hearth.

Apart from them, and reading, or affecting to read, for, although he had

held the volume for many minutes, the page remained unturned, sat one

who by word nor look took part in their merriment. With his arm resting

on the little table beside him, and his eyes shaded by the hand, over

which had fallen a profusion of dark silvered curls, he kept his eye

immovably upon his book, and neither looked up nor stirred.

“Look at Clifdon,” said one of the company, to his companions, “he is in

his dark mood to-night.”

“He is ever gloomy,” said the person addressed.

“True,” returned the first speaker, “he has never been the same since

the death of his pretty wife. Let me see, that was fifteen years ago,

soon after Mark Brendon was killed.”

“Ned was one of the same company?”

“Ay, ay. You should have seen us then. I was clown, with limbs a trifle

lighter than now; and Clifdon—as I said, he has never been the same

since her death.”

“She left but one child?”

“You mistake, she died in giving birth to pretty Lilia; but there was a

son, who was sent to old Mordaunt. Little Phil; he must almost be of age

now.”

The noise made by a vehicle dashing rapidly up to the tavern-door

arrested their attention, and the conversation was suspended.

There was a sound of heavy boots ringing upon the stone pavements as the

travelers sprung to the ground, a loud barking, and then a voice, whose

deep bass was like the reverberation of distant thunder, was heard

exclaiming, “Down, Pedro! Ho, there! Down close! Back to! Unbuckle the

leash, Philip.”

Then the voice of the host, like the yelp of a puppy after the growl of

a mastiff. “Fire, gentlemen? Yes, fire in the bar-room. This way, this

way.”

The door was flung open, and a man advanced in life, but of almost

gigantic height and proportions, entered the room. A heavy furred

over-coat was tightly buttoned across his broad chest, and the black

hunting-cap, which he had disdained to remove, shaded a brow, white and

massive as a slab of marble. Upon his shoulder rested a superbly

finished rifle, and from the flaps of his surcoat-pocket protruded the

silver handle of his hunting-knife. He was followed by a handsome youth

of about twenty, who, as he entered, shook the moisture from his

over-coat, and lifting his cap, brushed off the snow that had powdered

the shining sable of his hair. Two powerful hounds, of a rare and

foreign breed, sprung before him and secured their places by the hearth,

shaking vigorously as they passed, the water from their chilled limbs

upon those around them.

“Room here!” said the elder stranger, imperiously; and they whom he

addressed, intimidated, though resentful, moved back, while the new

comers drew their chairs before the fire.

A dead silence had succeeded their boisterous mirth, and while the elder

of the sportsmen sat wrapped in thought, his young companion, with a

countenance expressive of the most extreme ennui, occupied himself

alternately by pushing with his boot the logs that, when disturbed, sent

a torrent of bright sparks crackling up the chimney, and by teasing the

drowsy hounds stretched beside him.

Still apparently intent upon his book, but gazing earnestly upon the

twain through his parted fingers, sat Edward Clifdon.

At last the elder stranger spoke, but in German, to his companion. “I

have decided, Philip,” he said, abruptly. “You are young—too young; yet

I leave you your own master. I give my consent to your marriage some few

years hence, with the woman you have chosen, and chosen, I trust,

wisely.”

“A thousand, thousand thanks, my dear father,” began the youth, with

animation; but Mordaunt, for it was he, checked him.

“Thanks! yes, that I have decided in accordance with your wishes,” he

said, bitterly; “but had it been otherwise—how then, Philip?”

His companion spoke not, but looked deeply hurt.

“I have seen enough of filial disobedience,” said Mordaunt, rising as he

spoke, “to be doubtful with regard to the result; but we will let that

pass. Nay, no thanks, if you please; I am weary, and you know how I

detest a scene. Good night!” And striding hastily across the room, he

retired.

His grandson, or, as Philip Clifdon had been taught to believe himself,

his son, did not follow, but falling back in his chair, and planting his

feet upon the broad hearth, abandoned himself to vague and delicious

revery.

The constraint which the presence of Mordaunt had imposed, wore off with

his disappearance, until Philip, disturbed by the loud voices and

ringing laughter of those around, roused himself, and addressed a few

words to him who has been announced as the former clown of the little

company.

Clifdon had disappeared.

In the course of conversation with this man, young Clifdon, or rather

Mordaunt, for he bore the name of his supposed parent, had occasion to

draw forth and open his pen-knife. A singular dilation of the eye, a

sudden flush upon the countenance of his companion, arrested his

attention, but was forgotten, as the ex-clown, recovering his composure,

quietly observed,

“That is a curious blade—will you let me examine it?”

Young Mordaunt resigned it carelessly into his hands, remarking, “It is

a knife I seldom use, but having lost that I ordinarily carry, I have

been obliged to bring it forward.”

“It is an old-fashioned piece of work,” said Garvin, for such was his

name, earnestly examining it. “I think I have seen it before.”

“I value it as one that has been in my possession from my childhood,”

returned Philip. “It has served me trustily.”

“Here is a broken point,” said Garvin, opening a second blade. “What a

pity!”

“It has been broken ever since my remembrance,” returned the other.

As he spoke, his companion rising, either accidentally, or, as Philip

afterward suspected, from design, managed to catch with his foot the leg

of a table upon which a group of his companions had arranged their

smoking glasses. It was overthrown; and after the confusion this created

had in a measure subsided, Mordaunt looked in vain for the author of the

mischief. He had vanished, and with him the borrowed knife.

“So much for my confounded carelessness,” said the youth, internally, as

half vexed, half amused, he left the bar-room. “I will see to this

to-morrow; but not to-night, not to-night.” And why “not to-night” might

have been explained by the dreams that floated through his brain, as

beneath the moon that shone brightly in the now cloudless sky, he paced

to and fro upon the broad piazza of the inn.

CHAPTER IV.

Upon a couch, in one corner of a mean apartment, with folded arms and a

countenance livid with despair, sat Edward Clifdon; and before him, with

an exulting smile, stood the man who had so dexterously escaped during

the confusion in the bar-room.

“It is as I tell you, Clifdon,” he said, “the proofs are in my

possession. See you now. The drop of blood and your wounded finger; the

broken point which fell from the twist of the rope, and which tallies

exactly with the knife found in the possession of your own son—the

knife I have seen you use a hundred times; the money due from you to the

murdered man; your previous quarrel. Truly as that I now stand before

you, Edward Clifdon, it was your hand that tampered with the swing from

which Mark Brendon fell to meet his death.”

Huge drops gathered upon the brow of the wretched man, but no words fell

from his blanched and quivering lips.

“It was the horror of that thought that killed your wife,” pursued his

tormentor. “_I_ knew it; _I_ needed no further proof. But you are in my

power now, mine enemy.”

“Do as you will,” said Clifdon, gradually recovering from the shock

inflicted by this sudden and terrific accusation, and speaking with a

remnant of his ancient pride. “If years of anguish and remorse, and the

loss of her who was dearer than life’s self, be not sufficient

punishment, death has none darker.”

“Brave words!” said Garvin, sneering. “Will you stand up in the open

court, to be branded as a murderer? Will you receive the penalty the law

awards your crime?”

“Man!” said Edward Clifdon, sternly, and raising his shaken form from

the couch upon which he had fallen, “I tell you that in one moment of

remorse, one glance to the dark past, there may be more horror than in

all the shame and agony of the hangman’s rope; and if by my death I may

expiate before human eyes the sin that I have repented before my God, I

tell thee, I will meet it, and never tremble.”

“And your children?” returned the other, with a sardonic smile. “Your

little Lilia, and your boy, with his haughty brow and curling lip? Think

you they will not die for shame? A goodly heritage would you leave

them!”

Clifdon bowed his face upon his hands and groaned aloud.

“Revenge for me!” pursued his companion, tauntingly. “Revenge, to heap

ashes upon the head of the old man who looked scorn upon me to-night!

Revenge, to humble the gay youth who has already learned his pride!

Revenge, to see the beauty I covet cast friendless upon the world, and

perchance within my reach!”

With a wild cry Clifdon threw himself at his feet.

“Spare me!” he said; “spare them! By the heaven above us, I swear, that

from this moment I will be your slave! See, I kneel to you, mine enemy!

I will crouch beneath your feet; I will beg for you, toil for you; I

will bind myself to you, body and soul—only spare them!”

“No!—never! never!”

“Hark, man! If you have a human soul, listen to me! When I did the deed,

it was to save my wife, my child from starvation, from madness. I

thought not of myself, Garvin; by the great God, I did not! And by the

loss of the child I loved, of the wife for whom I had periled my soul;

by years of lone remorse and agony I was punished. Pity me! Pity

them—the boy with her sweet eyes and her smiling lips; the child she

left me on her death-bed—my little Lilia! Oh, mercy! mercy!”

Like the shriek of a damned spirit thrilled those last words.

“Give me Lilia,” said Garvin, eagerly, and bending forward.

“Monster!” shouted Clifdon, springing to his feet. “Name her not, lest,

tempted to a second crime, I strangle thee on the spot! To thee—_thee_?

My pure, my pretty Lilia? Sooner let her lie before me, with her winding

sheet about her! To _thee_? Off, monster! Off, hell-hound—off!”

Intimidated, Garvin retreated, but with outstretched arms his victim

followed. One moment more, and with the blood gushing from his mouth and

distended nostril, he had fallen to the floor. The tempest of passion

had proved too much for a frame already long shaken by fear and anguish;

and as Garvin, horror-stricken, raised him to the couch, life seemed

almost extinct.

A physician was called in, whose remedies stopped the immediate flow of

blood, but who attempted to give no hope of recovery. Ere he left the

room, however, the senses of his patient returned.

“Clear the room,” he said, in a low voice to Garvin, “and call _them_

both. If you are not fiend, do this.”

His orders were obeyed, and marveling at the summons, young Mordaunt

shortly after followed his grandfather to the room of the dying man.

A single lamp cast its dull rays through the deserted apartment upon the

deathly face of him who, with livid and muttering lips, and glassy,

upturned eyes, seemed uttering his last prayer to the unknown God, unto

whose throne his spirit was fleeting. But rarely beautiful amid the

gloom and horror of that desolate chamber, radiantly fair as a single

star shining through the hideous rack of the tempest, knelt by the

bedside, a girl—a child of fifteen summers; and with her hands clasped,

and the braids and curls of pale-brown hair showering from her upraised

face, upon the folds of her white night-robe, she looked up fearlessly,

as though through the dark-stained roof, she gazed, amid the blue above,

up into the mercy-seat of heaven.

And ever and anon the dying man tossed upon his bed, muttering with

ghastly lips, “Pray for me, Lilia; _thy_ lips are pure—pray!” and the

child prayed earnestly.

A slight movement of those without attracted his attention, and raising

himself in his bed with reviving strength, he beckoned the elder

Mordaunt to his side.

“This is death,” he murmured, “terrible, terrible death! Look upon it,

old man, and refuse, if you can, the mercy my God will not deny me!”

“What would you with me?” said Mordaunt, moving restlessly. “What would

you, Edward Clifdon, for I know you now?”

“Mercy, mercy!” said the dying man. “You cursed _her_ that she clung to

me, and _I_ pray for your forgiveness. Let me bear your pardon to her

whither I go.”

“Is she then dead?” said Mordaunt, quickly.

“Thank God that I may say it! Thank God, save for Lilia’s sake!”

“And Lilia,” said Mordaunt, after a deep pause.

“Her child, her last-born, who is even now at my side. And for her, and

for her only, would I supplicate!” As he spoke, he would have thrown

himself from his bed, but his companion forcibly withheld him.

“Kneel not to _me_!” he said, sternly. “My forgiveness is yours; but I

have sworn, and my oath may not be broken. Kneel not to _me_.” But as he

spoke, his eye wandered toward his grandson.

“It shall never pass my lips,” said Clifdon, eagerly, and catching that

roving glance. “He shall never hear from me, and Lilia knows it not.”

Mordaunt understood him. “Call him,” he said, turning away. “I forbid

you not.” And Philip, summoned, advanced, wondering, to the bedside.

But as Clifdon gazed upon the face of him he yearned to clasp to his

bosom and call his son, speech utterly deserted him, and with a face of

anguish and wringing hands, he could only point to the crouching form

beside him, and the bright head that was now buried amid the drapery of

the couch.

And over the soul of the young man there seemed to come a vague and

singular remembrance; and pressing his hand upon his brow, he stood like

one who strives to recall a bygone thought that ever, despite his

efforts, eludes his grasp.

Clifdon was the first to break this dangerous silence.

“Lilia!” he said, and she raised her face, no longer rapt and beaming,

but pallid as his own, and deluged with her flowing tears.

“We are strangers,” said Clifdon, turning to Philip, and speaking with

difficulty, “nevertheless, as the ear of God is open alike to all, so

may one of his creatures in the extremity of need, call upon his fellow.

I call upon _you_ now, as you value the mercy of that God, to be

merciful.”

“Speak on,” said Philip, with emotion, and bending over the lowly couch.

“Look at my child!” said Clifdon, with a cry of anguish; “on the child I

have kept pure as the spirit of her mother! Look upon her. Shall she be

cast upon the wide world to eat the bread of shame or starve?”

With a quivering lip the youth averted his eyes.

“Take her, oh, take her!” murmured the dying man. “She is yours! be unto

her as a brother! Save her, I pray you! Snatch my lamb from the jaws of

the wolf!”

Still hesitating, Philip raised his eyes to his grandfather’s face.

“I leave you free,” said Mordaunt, in a voice hoarse with emotion; “be

it as you will.”

With a sudden impulse, the young man bent down and raised in his arms

the light and childish form. But she struggled for freedom.

“Ah! no, no!” she shrieked, “I will go with thee, my father!”

“Lilia—child—in mercy!—you harrow my soul!”

Instantly she was motionless, but her face became like death, as it

rested on the bosom of her supporter, and from beneath her delicate lids

the large tears stole silently.

Deeper and more labored became the respiration of the dying man; and as

the agony of death wrung the drops from his working brow, he murmured

unconsciously her name.

In a moment she was at his side, with her small arms clasped across his

heaving chest, and her eyes turned eagerly upon his face.

“Lilia! my precious one—my child! _her_ blessing, not mine, rest upon

thee!”

“Thine! thine, my father!—Leave me thine!”

He raised himself in his bed, and with her little hands clasped in his

own, spoke solemnly, and in a firm voice.

“Not with the lips of purity, not with the heart of the upright man may

I invoke a blessing on thee, my Lilia. But if love, perfect love, that

has never known chill or change; that has kept thee inviolate in the

midst of guilt, and lovely, though surrounded by corruption—if such can

win a smile from Heaven, it is thine.”

His head sunk lower and lower, until it rested upon her innocent brow,

and upon her shining curls. Suddenly she started with a piteous cry.

“He is cold! he is dead! Leave me not yet, oh, my father!” and lifeless

as the corse beside her, the orphan fell to the ground.

Yet a few days, and Philip Mordaunt, strong in the hopes of youth and

love, passed forever from the house of death. Unconscious that the

little being, whose fair head rested upon his bosom, and whose welfare

he had sworn to guard with a brother’s love, possessed indeed a sister’s

claim; unconscious that his presence had soothed the dying hour of a

parent; unconscious how nearly he had been sent forth branded as the son

of a felon. Thus tread we ever blindly amid the precipices of our fate.

* * * * *

BIRD-NOTES.

BY WM. H. C. HOSMER.

Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and

the turtle, and the crane and the swallow, observe the time of

their coming. JER. C. VII. V. 7.

THE stork in heaven knoweth

Her own appointed time,

And like an arrow goeth

Back to our colder clime:

The turtle, crane and swallow

Come, on unerring wing,

When northern hill and hollow

Bask in the light of Spring.

But we, endowed with reason,

Cannot foreknow the hour—

The sweet, appointed season

For bursting of Hope’s flower;

When near the glad fruition

Of toil that worked annoy—

When sorrow’s drear condition

Gives place to heart-felt joy.

Lo! blighting frost encroaches

On Autumn’s sad domain,

And Winter wild approaches

To end his feeble reign:

The birds of passage gather

And fly across the wave,

Their guide a Heavenly Father,

Omnipotent to save;

But man, with reason gifted,

Cannot the hour foreknow

When Hope’s bright curtain lifted

Reveals a waste of wo;

When clouds send lightning flashes

Our idols to consume,

And dreams, resolved to ashes,

Are scattered on his tomb.

* * * * *

THE DAWN OF THE HUNDRED DAYS.

BY R. J. DE CORDOVA.

THE evening of a cold and stormy day in February had just set in, when a

traveling carriage of rather a better order than usual arrived at the

gates of the large and populous town of L——, in the south of France.

The horses were covered with foam, and hung their heads with that jaded

appearance of fatigue which tells of the labors of a long and hasty

journey. The postillion presented the anomalous appearance of a

dispirited Frenchman. Drenched to the skin, and bespattered with mud, he

descended from his seat on the near horse, and ejaculating with

considerable fervor that pithy monosyllable “_peste!_” which Sterne has

rendered famous, he opened the door of the vehicle for the travelers to

alight.

The interior of the carriage was occupied by two men, of whom this elder

might be five-and-thirty years of age, and the younger nineteen. The one

was a handsome, bold-looking, tall man, with rather large black

moustaches, and eyes of the same color; the younger had soft and

delicate features, much more effeminate than manly, but prepossessing

and attractive, with blue eyes, delicate brown moustaches and whiskers,

and dark brown hair. The younger of the travelers awoke as the carriage

stopped, and called to the other in a delicate and musical voice, which

quite accorded with his juvenile appearance, “Rouse up, Pierre; we are

already at L.” The sleeper awoke at the summons, and motioning his

companion to be silent, bade the postillion call the sergeant of the

guard, and request him to attend at the door of the carriage, in order

to _viser_ the passports, as the travelers were invalids whom it would

be dangerous to remove. The boy did as he was desired, and in a few

moments returned with the officer of the guard, who bore a huge sword in

one hand and a lantern in the other.

“Bon soir, Monsieur l’officier,” said the elder traveler.

“Bon soir, Monsieur le voyageur,” returned the other drily.

“Do you know the reason, M. l’officier, why I have come to L.?” asked M.

Pierre.

“_Dame!_” replied the officer, “how should I know why you have come to

L.? My business is to see that your passports are correct, if you

please, and I will trouble you to show them to me as early as you can

make it convenient to do so, for standing in the rain does not benefit

the constitution.”

“I am sorry,” returned the traveler, “that you have so little curiosity,

my friend; but as you will not ask me the question, I will give you the

reason of my own accord. I came here because I knew that Jacques Lapin

would be the officer on guard to-night, and would allow me to pass even

if he suspected my disguise.”

“Diable!” shouted the other—“Eh! pardieu! no man knows me by that name

except my former colonel, Monsieur Desart,” and he looked up in the face

of his visiter by the light of the lantern which he held in his hand.

“Ventrebleu! it is indeed he, and the other must be—”

“Silence!” interrupted the colonel. “Here are the passports, let them be

_visées_ directly.”

The alacrity with which the order was obeyed manifested some authority

on the one hand, and no small amount of obedience on the other. In

considerably less time than usual the passports were returned to the

travelers, the gloomy postillion mounted to his former perch, and the

carriage slowly rumbled through the ill-paved, ill-lighted, and

otherwise ill-appointed town of L.

Until they reached the hotel neither of the travelers could trust

himself to speak. The victory over impending danger and the present

sense of security were too much for words. But as soon as the door of

the double-bedded room which they had ordered had closed upon them, they

threw themselves into each other’s arms, and sunk on their knees

together in gratitude for their deliverance.

Colonel Desart had risen from a very humble rank in a foot regiment to

be its colonel. He in a great measure owed his promotion to courage,

excellent military judgment, and that admirable _savoir-faire_ which is

peculiarly characteristic of an educated Frenchman. He was,

nevertheless, indebted for much of the signal good fortune which

attended his rise to the partiality of the emperor. Napoleon, who was a

profound believer in physiognomy, and who moreover prided himself on

being an almost infallible physiognomist, imagined that he could

discover marks of great fidelity in the lineaments of Desart’s visage,

and trusted him accordingly. Nor was he mistaken; for Desart was ever

grateful for the patronage bestowed, and the kindness which was

manifested toward him.

It was owing to this partiality that Desart had been able to intercede

successfully with the emperor for the life of Jacques Lapin, who had

once been condemned to be shot, for a frolick which might have been

attended with serious consequences. Nothing would please M. Jacques

Lapin, private of the —th foot, on the evening before Jena, when it was

absolutely necessary that the position of the army should be kept as

much as possible from the knowledge of the enemy, but to adorn two

stuffed images of the Emperor of Austria and his imperial spouse with

heavy cartridges, and display the same by the aid of fire before the

eyes of his delighted countrymen. The reflection of Lapin’s pyrotechnic

pleasantry shone even in the tent of Napoleon. The offender was dragged

forth and ordered for instant execution. But Desart seized the moment

when the emperor’s anger had somewhat abated, ridiculed the exhibition

of the unfortunate artiste, proved to demonstration that he had been

incited thereto only by his hatred of the enemies of France, got the

emperor into good temper and secured a pardon for Lapin, who, as we have

seen, did not omit to be grateful in the hour of need.

After basking for so long a period in the sunshine of the emperor’s

favor it was with sincere grief that Desart learned, on his return from

Moscow, after a long and tedious illness which afflicted him on his way,

that his patron and benefactor had quitted France and was then in the

island of Elba. His first impulse was to disregard his own feelings as a

husband, to leave, for his young and amiable wife, the still ample

remnant of his once considerable fortune, and to follow his illustrious

patron to his place of exile. But the formation of those wild but heroic

clubs of “Buonapartists” led him to change his determination. He felt

that he could do more good to the cause of the emperor by assisting it

with his counsel, and, if necessary, with his sword, than if he were to

retire to the presence of Napoleon for the purpose of sharing an exile

which, to say the least, was inactive and useless. He therefore resolved

to remain in France. He joined one of the most powerful of these clubs,

and became so enthusiastic in his desire for an immediate counter

revolution that he was unable, in public, sufficiently to conceal his

political bias. He soon fell under the suspicion of the suspicious

court, and was fortunate enough to receive, from a devoted brother

officer, information of an arrest having been signed, within a minute or

two after that document had passed under the hands of the minister. He

had scarcely time to effect the necessary disguise of his person, and to

pass through one of the gates of Paris, before the alarm was given

generally, and ordered to be disseminated throughout the provinces. With

the aid of an old passport, however, the date of which had been

ingeniously altered, he contrived to evade all the posts on the route,

until he arrived at L., where his confidence in his disguise failed him,

and he resolved rather to trust to the fidelity and gratitude of his

former subordinate soldier.

Le Chevalier Pierre Babat de la Bonbonnerie, and his brother Monsieur

Louis Babat soon became extremely fashionable in L. Everybody thought it

a duty to call on so accomplished a nobleman who, there was no doubt,

had much influence at court; and the chevalier’s table soon “groaned,”

as the fashionable novelists of the day term it, “under the weight of

visiters’ cards.” The papas of all the respectable families in the town

called on the new comers, and not a few mammas of unmarried daughters

waited with impatience the visit of the fashionable brothers, to whose

credit a vast deal of interest with the king was immediately set down.

It was far from being the interest of the colonel to keep himself

secluded from society. Retirement would have created mystery, and

mystery would have set all the officious mischief-mongers of L. writing

voluminous dispatches to the minister of police in Paris; by which means

his retreat would have been discovered, and his plans frustrated. He

accordingly returned all the visits which were paid at his hotel,

sometimes accompanied by his brother, but most frequently alone. In the

meanwhile, the younger ladies of L. had, individually and collectively,

lost their hearts to the young Monsieur Louis Babat. He was considered

“charming, _piquant_, so delicate a figure, so sweet a voice, so elegant

an every thing in fact.” The strangers were duly fêted, and amused in

every variety of way which the ingenuity of the inhabitants could

invent. The gentlemen became jealous as fast as the young ladies grew

enamored of Monsieur L., and the peace and quiet of the town of L. was

more disturbed by the arrival of monsieur le chevalier and his brother,

than Paris had been by his departure.

Madame la Comtesse de Demibête, in particular, was very desirous to

bring about a match between her daughter and Monsieur Louis. This young

lady was, to say the truth, much superior to the generality of the lady

butterflies who were so much attracted by the new light; but as she was

enamored of a young merchant, on whose birth the proud mamma looked down

with considerable disdain, and who was then on a voyage to the Indies,

she was not likely to fall very readily into the plan of captivation

which her mamma designed for the young _nouveau venu_. Between

Mademoiselle Mathilde and Monsieur Louis, however, there appeared to

grow up a sort of feeling which no one could understand. It was not

love, for it seemed to be entirely divested of every thing like passion;

it was not indifference, for there really seemed to exist a sort of

affection between the two young people. All therefore that the

scandal-mongers of L. could discover, was that they knew nothing about

it, and that it was impossible to fathom the nature of the partiality

which was so palpably evinced on both sides. Immediately, however, it

was ascertained that there was a _penchant_ on the part of Monsieur

Louis for one of the young ladies, all the rest broke out into bitter

enmity against the offending “boy,” (a great deal was meant to be

conveyed by the use of this word) who could dare to choose one

particular young lady from among so many who voluntarily offered. “And

she, too,” as they one and all remarked, “by no means either pretty or

witty, or even tolerably sensible.” It was at a large evening party

given by M. Bassecour, a converted Buonapartist, (people were converted

most miraculously after the abdication,) who preserved a sort of middle

place between the aristocracy and the people, and whose company,

consequently, consisted of a strange mêlée of both classes, that the

first positive outbreak took place.

The chevalier and his brother had arrived late; and, in spite of all

their attempts to appear at ease and cheerful, there was an evident

disquiet and an unusual degree of thoughtfulness unwillingly expressed

on their countenances. The rooms were filled when they arrived, and

several dancers were enjoying their favorite exercise in excellent

spirits. Such of the young ladies as were not dancing, immediately

separated and repaired to unoccupied sofas, where they might leave spare

seats beside them—a manœuvre which is often performed by young ladies

when a favorite enters the room—for what reason, of course, they best

know.

Monsieur Louis Babat looked rather wearily round the room for his friend

Mathilde. She was dancing with the brother of the young merchant, much

to the rage and chagrin of her aristocratic mamma. Shunning the too

lively clatter of the ladies, Louis seated himself near two dowagers,

who were warmly discussing the correct pattern of the new court-sleeve

for evening dresses, hoping that they would be too much engrossed by

their wordy combat to attend to him. He was doomed to disappointment.

Madame Nezrouge no sooner discovered who her neighbor was than she

immediately turned to the attack.

“Ah! Monsieur Louis, I am charmed to see you. You are late this

evening—but you seem ill. Is any thing the matter?”

“Yes, madame,” answered Louis, “I have not been well to-day.”

“Ah!” returned the old lady, “I see how it is. You young men dissipate

too much. You should marry, Monsieur Louis. You should look out to

settle yourself in life: all young men should. But I do not wonder,

indeed I cannot, at young men remaining single. The young ladies of the

present day are not what they were when my lamented husband had the

honor of carrying Louis the Sixteenth’s snuff-box. They are too bold,

Monsieur Louis—much too bold. I am sure I preach enough to my girls.

Many and many’s the time I say to them, ‘continue, my dear children, in

your present course. Do not imitate the follies and vanities of your

companions. The great aim of a woman’s life should be to make her

husband happy.’ Thank Heaven my girls listen to my advice. _They_ are

not like the rest. I’m sure, my poor lamented husband, who had the honor

of carrying the king’s snuffbox used often to say—”

“Who knows what to-morrow may bring forth!” murmured Louis, between his

teeth, carried away from the babble of his neighbor by the intensity of

his own feelings.

“Why, yes, Monsieur Louis,” continued the old lady, “he did say that,

too, sometimes, though how you ever came to know it, I am sure _I_ can’t

tell—but what I was going to say—”

“Pardon me, madam, but Mademoiselle Mathilde is about to sing. Would you

permit me to join her at the piano?”

“Oh! certainly, if you wish it,” returned Madame Nezrouge, bridling up.

“_Of_ course: oh! certainly.”

In fact, Mathilde had already taken her place at the piano. She had one

of those sweet, dear, yet mellow voices which belong only to southern

countries, and she sang with deep feeling, as well as artistic

correctness. As Louis walked to the piano, his brother whispered in his

ear, “Be firm, for God’s sake; he is here.”

The lip of Louis quivered as he prepared to turn the leaves of the page

before Mathilde, and he was so excited that he did not hear one syllable

of the following song.

THE MEMORY OF LOVE.

Though boundless seas between us roll

And keep our lips and eyes apart,

Thou art not absent! for my soul

Treasures thine image; and my heart

In every throb thy name repeats.

Ah! Mem’ry’s spell

Awakes too well

Its echoes as it beats.

Thou art not absent! every thought

Is thine alone! Thou art still with me;

For my mind’s eye, by mem’ry taught,

Looks back into my mind—ON THEE.

In sleep, a voice, ah! not unknown

My pillow seeks:

’Tis mem’ry speaks;

That voice! ’tis all thine own.

Before the song was concluded, a group of ladies had been formed in the

centre of the room wondering what could possibly cause the singular

agitation of Monsieur Louis. Some whispered that it was love—others

that it was wine—and one or two audibly expressed a pious wish that it

might not “prove something worse,” which many persons are ever ready to

do whenever they happen to be profoundly ignorant.

As Louis gave his arm to Mathilde to lead her from the piano, his

brother whispered in his ear, “Courage for one hour more—It is all

right; Lapin has returned.”

A ray of joy shone over the pallid features of the youth, as he heard

these words; yet he seemed to tremble. He had advanced as far as the

group of ladies, with his brother on one arm and Mathilde on the other,

when a sinister looking individual was seen to approach from the other

end of the room. There appeared, for the moment, to be considerable

excitement among the company, but every thing was as silent as the grave

while the strange man marched slowly up to the chevalier.

“Du par le Roi,” said he, as he approached, “I arrest you, Colonel

Desart, on a charge of treason against the king.”

“Colonel Desart, the Buonapartist!” shrieked the horrified ladies, in

discordant chorus.

“The same, ladies, at your service,” replied the colonel, with that look

of quiet and sarcastic disdain which annihilates impertinence.

“Du par le Roi,” continued the savage-looking individual, addressing

Louis, “I arrest you Madame Louise Desart, née Plestours—”

The storm of voices here interrupted the officer.

“What! _Madame_ Desart! a woman!”

“Yes, ladies,” returned the soft, sweet voice of the abashed lady, “I

could not leave my husband in his danger.” She turned as she spoke, and

fell fainting in the arms of the affectionate Mathilde, whose

penetration had long since discovered the secret of her sex but whose

prudence and good breeding had put a seal upon her lips on that subject.

“You are my prisoners,” said the dark man, turning towards the colonel,

who was quietly putting his whiskers and black wig into the fire; “you

will, if you please, prepare for instant departure to Paris.”

“Indeed,” coolly replied the colonel, “I shall not go to Paris to-night,

nor yet to-morrow.”

“Monsieur, the colonel,” said his captor, “will forgive me if I remind

him that I have with me an armed force, to sustain the authority of the

king’s command.”

“Oh! do not disturb yourself at all on my account,” replied the colonel,

“I dare say you have an armed force—so have I—what then?”

“Monsieur is jesting,” answered the officer. “You must really depart at

once for Paris.”

“For what purpose, my good friend?” asked the colonel, with enviable

_naiveté_.

“Parbleu! it is the king’s pleasure,” returned the other—who began to

feel that he was being quizzed.

“But the king will not be in Paris when I arrive, Monsieur l’Officier.

How then?”

“Oh! diable! you must wait till his majesty comes back—that’s all.”

“But he will never come back, Monsieur l’Officier.”

“Mille tonnéres! and why not?” thundered the officer, who was waxing

wroth, in proportion as his prisoner become cooler. “And why will not

the king come back?”

“Oh, I will tell you why, with all my heart,” replied the colonel, “and

when you go back to Paris, which you will do by yourself all alone,

presently, and even without your soldiers, you can retail the

information in every quartier and faubourg. Here! stoop down and I’ll

tell you quietly.”

The officer stooped as he was bidden, with a heart full of misgiving,

while the colonel shouted with the voice of an officer commanding a

regiment,

“Because THE EMPEROR is in France, and will be in L. in a few moments;

and further, because his avant-garde is now passing through these

streets on the way to the Tuilleries.”

He had scarcely concluded the last sentence, before a tremendous shout

of “_Vive l’Empereur_,” was heard from the street. The officer turned

and fled, as Lapin sprang into the room, threw up the window which

overhung the street, and joined, with all his might, in the loud viva of

joy which marked the unhappy return of Napoleon Buonaparte to the land

which his valor had twice won for him.

Colonel and Madame Desart started for Paris early next morning, in the

train of the emperor.

* * * * *

SYMBOLS.

BY THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.

I LOOKED all abroad for a symbol of thee,

And a thousand bright symbols replied,

They bloomed on the land, they shone on the sea—

There were flowers and stars that likened might be

To thy beautiful spirit, so nearly allied

To all that is brightest on land or on sea.

The brooks on the hills in their crystaline flow,

Singing out of their mystical springs,

The heralds of joy to the valleys below,

Making all things more lovely wherever they go,

Are the types of thy spirit, whose beautiful wings

Make gladness and music wherever they go.

The birds, the sybiline birds of the grove,

Entempled in shadowy bloom,

Or clothed in a luminous vesture above

Of sunshine and azure and music and love,

Are the types of thy soul, that in brightness or gloom

Is clothed in a luminous vesture of love.

All things are thy symbols—thou sheddest on all

The lustre and sweetness of Song,

Like the angels whose star-loving pinions let fall

A glory that holdeth true poets in thrall:—

To thee all things lovely as symbols belong.

And thou art the beautiful symbol of all.

* * * * *

SONNET. TO SHIRLEY.

BY WM. P. BRANNAN.

LIKE a delicious dream that fades away

When morning zephyr breathes into the room,

Bearing from unknown blossoms their perfume—

Though thou art gone, still round my spirit play

The radiant memories of thy maiden bloom;

Delightful fancies riot in my brain,

A painful gladness thrills my throbbing heart,

And I would live forever thus apart,

Deeming such bliss may never come again.

Enchanting vision! hast thou fled for aye?

Thy seeming presence haunts me with a spell,

That musing on thy image thus alway,

The world would smile again an Eden-dell

Where all things lovely should delight to dwell.

* * * * *

THE FIRST LOVE OF ADA SOMERS.

BY A NEW CONTRIBUTOR.

Poca favilla gran Fiamma seconda. DANTE.

WHEN Ada Somers was a romp of twelve years, she chanced one day, in too

bold a search for some water-lilies, to fall headlong into the stream

from whose blue depths they lifted their pretty heads.

Truth alone compels us to relate this mishap of Ada’s: for although the

_quasi_ drowning of heroines has been a popular tableau of romance ever

since streams and heroines were; still, this is the era of

investigation; and we who on our railroads outstrip the speed of the

bronze horse—we for whom the delicate and trembling wires of the

telegraph do the office of a thousand Ariels—we who have called upon

the sun to be our portrait-painter, and upon the moon to yield up her

secrets that our lecture-rooms may be crowed; surely we have some right

to think for ourselves! and we boldly proclaim that nothing can be less

sublime and more ridiculous than the loss of one’s equilibrium—a plunge

head-foremost—and the spectacle of two inverted feet without any

apparent body.

Perhaps that sometime race of heroines, who wandered up hill and down

dale in satin slippers—unsoiled—undraggled—and unscratched—and wept

without the concomitants of red eyes and swelled noses; perhaps a race

of such curious physiological construction possessed also the secret of

losing their balance without losing their grace. But our poor Ada was

not of this race: she was only a little American girl, subject to the

laws of gravitation, so she fell into the river in the manner above

described. Poor little thing! she might have floated off to keep company

with Glendower’s spirits in the vasty deep, but for the timely

interposition of a certain youth, by name James Darrington. James was

taking his afternoon ride along the river-bank, when he heard a sudden

splash, and turned his eyes just in time to catch a view of the two

little feet above-mentioned. He was not, like the Countess Hahn-Hahn,

versed in the physiognomy of feet, so without venturing a guess as to

the ownership of the pair in question, he sprung from his horse and

plunged into the river.

The spot where Ada had fallen was deep, and its bed was a mass of

treacherous slime; but James was a bold swimmer, and after some moments

of struggle, ay, and of danger too, he succeeded in bearing his prize to

the shore.

Now, as Ada was no heroine, she did not emerge from the river like a

water-nymph: her faithful chronicler is fain to say that her dress was a

net-work of slimy weeds; that her hair was tangled, and her face dirty.

Nevertheless, she was a pretty little thing in spite of her draggled

condition, and when James went home and thought over the matter, he felt

bound by the chivalry of fifteen to fall in love with her, and he did

so. To be sure, he had passed Ada Somers a hundred times, in his

father’s house and at hers, without bestowing a thought upon her—but

now that Destiny had thrown her into his arms, he saw that her hazel

eyes were starry with brightness—that her rosy mouth was the nest of

all the loves—and he resolved to keep her where she was.

Up to the day of her mishap, Ada had never thought of any thing more

sentimental than skipping-ropes, pet fawns and ponies—but she suddenly

became addicted to solitary walking, wild-flowers and moonlight. (N. B.

_These_ tastes lasted for about a week.) And instead of scampering over

the country with a servant behind her, her pony Lightfoot roamed his

paddock in lazy leisure, unless James Darrington was at liberty to

accompany Lightfoot’s mistress in her ride.

James, though only fifteen, was so accomplished a horseman that Ada’s

parents had no hesitation in committing her to his care. They were often

joined in their rides by Ada’s favorite playmate, Catharine Ashton; but

sometimes they rode alone, and although these rides were generally

silent ones, still James thought them pleasanter when Catharine’s merry

voice was not constantly challenging them to some childish feat, or

making the woods ring with its bursts of glee.

“I hope I shall have her to myself to-day,” thought he, as he rode up

the oak avenue to Mr. Somers’ house. Yes, there was Lightfoot pawing the

ground _alone_—and no Catharine trying Fenella feats—cracking her

riding-whip, and breaking the luxurious silence of his reveries with her

ceaseless mirth.

James threw himself from his horse, rushed up the steps of the portico,

and just as he was stammering an apology to Mrs. Somers for nearly

upsetting her as she advanced to greet him, Ada came out equipped for

her ride.

How sweetly the little gipsy looked, with her habit of dark green, her

tiny while collar, and her black velvet hat and plume. Before James

could present his hand, she sprung into her saddle, and cantered off

with such speed that he put spurs to his horse to overtake her. The

woods were gorgeous with beauty. Summer still lingered in the tender

green of some trees, while others, tinted by the bold hand of autumn,

towered in all the pomp of scarlet and yellow foliage. The crisp leaves

rustled to the tread of their horses’ hoofs, and the soft breeze that

swept over golden meadow and sunny hill, came laden to their young

hearts with those sweet, vague reveries that visit the soul but

_once—but once!_—in that untried season of youth when the earth seems

starred with flowers, the sea mirrors naught but heaven, and the very

consciousness of animal life is happiness. For some time the youthful

pair rode on in silence, till at length emerging from the shady woods

they came suddenly to an opening, where a grassy slope led down to the

river, and to the spot which some months before had been the scene of

Ada’s misfortune.

“Oh, how beautiful!” exclaimed she, as she drew in her rein to look

around. The turf was still bright with sunshine—the waters sparkled as

if they had stolen the golden bed of the Pactolus—and above them,

forever changing shape and hue, floated the silver clouds that hide from

mortal gaze the home of Immortality!

“Beautiful!” was the response of her companion.

“Did you ever see such a bright sky!” continued the delighted child of

nature. “And such a soft green turf, which, by the bye, Lightfoot is

enjoying in _his_ way—see, James, how nicely he crops the grass in a

circle. Do you remember the story of the Dervise and the stray Camel?

How he not only knew him to be astray, but found out that he was blind

of one eye, lame in one leg, had lost a tooth, and was loaded with corn

and honey, and all without having seen him? What a curious observer he

must have been, that dervise!”

No answer was vouchsafed to this piece of Oriental lore, whose

connection with Lightfoot’s skill in cropping grass was somewhat

unintelligible to one who had not read the story; so Ada broke into new

raptures over the beauty of the river.

This time James looked up, and gazed earnestly at her varying and

animated countenance. “That stream had nearly wedded us, Ada.”

Ada tossed her pretty little head as she replied, “I am glad that I

escaped such an ugly bridal.”

“Pshaw!” thought James, “she is but a child, and does not understand

me.”

And he was quite right; for while he was perfectly aware of his being

“in love,” Ada was utterly ignorant of the meaning of the phrase. All

she knew was that James Darrington’s presence materially increased her

happiness; but she would not have confessed to the very reeds and rushes

that she liked him even more than she did her dear Catharine. Her wise

and gentle mother, aware that her little daughter was in an Eden of

ignorant bliss, prudently forbore to tender her the fruit of precocious

wisdom. She knew that Ada was as childish as became her years, and she

judged it best to leave that little heart undisturbed by knowledge of

the good and evil of artificial life.

James, on the contrary, though he ventured no more declarations to the

lady of his thoughts, indemnified himself for the same, by pouring out

his ecstasies into his mother’s ear. Mrs. Darrington was something more

than amused with this juvenile courtship; she was delighted to be the

recipient of her son’s confessions: too well skilled in the human heart

to repulse his confidence by ridicule, she contented herself with

reminding him that to win Ada he must deserve her. So, the course of Mr.

James Darrington’s true love ran on, for a while, without a ripple.

CHAPTER II.

Oh! how this Spring of Love resembleth

The uncertain glory of an April day.

TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.

Some months again passed away, when, one morning, as James was about to

leave the breakfast-room, he saw his mother suddenly put down an open

letter, which she had been reading, and turn to his father with an

exclamation—“Minister to France, William! Is this a stroke of Fortune

or of _Mis_fortune?”

“Such a question,” replied Mr. Darrington, “requires no answer. Whatever

my appointment be to me, to you, I see that it is misfortune. But you

are a woman, and therefore a stranger to the pleasures of ambition.”

“And to its pains,” said the wife quietly.

“Then from you,” resumed Mr. D., with a shade of vexation in his

tone—“from you I may expect no congratulation. Have you no pride in

such a mark of confidence to me from my country?”

“If by ‘your country’ you mean, as I suppose you do, your government, I

fear that I am not to be any more elated by its confidence than

depressed by its distrust. And besides,” continued she fondly, “my pride

in you, William, is of too old a date to be increased by political

success.”

The husband smiled, as what husband would not, to so flattering a

declaration.

“Whether I be worthy of such praise or not, Julia, _you_ must be right,

as you always are, for your flattery has driven politics out of my head.

See how the magic of a few kind words has transformed his Excellency the

Minister into William Darrington, the most devoted of his wife’s

vassals.”

“‘Ambition should be made of sterner stuff,’ William.”

“So it should, dearest, and therefore you need never fear her as a

rival. The fact is, that I have been at my distaff so long as to love my

very servitude. But here is a fellow smiling saucily to hear us talking

of love. He thinks we should leave such things to Quixotic young

gentlemen of sixteen, who go about the world rescuing hapless damsels

from watery graves. Well, my boy,” continued he, rising, “since you are

so precocious a gallant, what think you of exchanging pretty little Ada

Somers for some black-eyed nymph, who traces her pedigree to the

crusades, and calls herself Montmorency or De Longueville?”

James said nothing to this treasonable discourse; but like the silent

parrot, “_il n’enpensait pas moins_;” and his thoughts were by no means

flattering to the Ladies de Montmorency and de Longueville.

“What!” exclaimed his father, at the sight of his lugubrious

countenance—“at your age not enchanted to see the world! Your little

Omphale must have strong spells indeed if she can chain the roving

spirit of sixteen to her feet! But come! I hear my phaeton at the

door—I am going to town, and I want you to drive those little gray

ponies for me to-day.”

At any other time the gray ponies would have divided James’ heart with

Omphale herself, but just then love was in the ascendant, and he could

only stammer out—

“I would—if you would—please to excuse me this morning, sir.”

But his father knew better than to excuse him, and after some persuasion

they drove off together. At first, the discomfited lover held his reins

in dejected silence, but by and bye the infection of his father’s

cheerfulness spread over his young heart, his reins grew tighter, and

his horses went faster, and by the time they reached the city, as he

dashed along the streets at full speed, his brain was a kaleidoscope in

which love, horses, Ada Somers and boyish curiosity tumbled about in

glorious confusion.

Meanwhile Mrs. Darrington ordered her carriage and drove over to

acquaint Mrs. Somers with her intended departure. For a series of years

the families had been united in such close friendship that it was

natural the movements of one should sufficiently interest the other to

be made the object of a special visit.

Mrs. Somers, though her acquaintance in town was numerous, could hope,

in none of her idle visiters, to find a substitute for her old friend;

and she was sincerely distressed at this separation. They sat together

for some hours, talking of the prospects of their children—their fears

and hopes—the one trembling as she spoke of the dangerous career of her

boy—the other, as she remembered that _her_ child, as a woman, was to

receive her fate from the hands of others. They then naturally fell upon

the subject of their children’s mutual inclination, and wondered whether

their destinies would ever be united.

“Ada is very near to my heart,” said Mrs. Darrington; “but it would be

too much to expect any serious results from this childish freak.”

“We must leave them to themselves,” replied Ada’s mother. “In such

cases, it is sacrilegious to lay a hand upon the web of the Fates; but I

confess, I should be glad to know that Ada would ever marry your son.”

“Here she comes,” interrupted Mrs. Darrington; “I am curious to know

what _she_ will think of Mr. Darrington’s appointment.”

Ada ran up the steps, followed by her shadow, Catharine Ashton, who,

guiltless of admirers, was addicted to romping of every kind. Not but

what Miss Ada heartily enjoyed a romp herself, but of late she had

become ashamed of being caught climbing fences and running races. At

that moment, however, she had entirely forgotten that she ever braided

her hair, or tied her sash “_avec intention_;” for the said sash

streamed like a pennant to the wind, while the hair followed the same

direction. Catharine, behind her, in much the same guise, was trying not

to make _too_ great a clatter upon the marble pavement of the hall; but

Ada dashed on like a young Bacchante, and never stopped till she reached

the lawn behind the house, where she threw herself full length on the

grass, and screamed to Catharine to do the same.

“She is something of a romp, my Ada,” said Mrs. Somers, smiling. “Not

yet a lady, certainly.”

“So much the better,” replied her friend. “Who would wish to stretch

those free young limbs upon a Procrustean bed of propriety?”

“Not I, certainly,” said the mother. “But I am sometimes afraid that in

my dread of making Ada artificial, I give too much sway to—Nature.”

“Not to such a nature as hers. Were there any tendency to coarseness in

Ada’s mirth, you might be right to moderate it; but where nature is

graceful in her wildness, no art can compete with her in loveliness.”

Another shout of mirth was heard, and Ada and Catharine burst into the

parlor.

“What descent of wild Indians is this, Ada?” asked her mother, doubting

the grace or refinement of this last movement. Ada started back,

coloring with shame, and Catharine sneaked behind the nearest _causeuse_

that offered concealment.

Mrs. Darrington easily divined that Ada’s embarrassment had special

reference to _her_ presence; so she smilingly extended her hand, and as

Ada advanced with sheepish mien and awkward gait, she kissed her and

said,

“I am glad to find you so merry, Ada. What a nice romp you must have had

under those shady trees.”

At so gracious an opening, Catharine’s head appeared above the frame of

the _causeuse_, but seeing Mrs. Darrington look toward her, down it

popped again.

Mrs. Darrington saw her plainly enough; but she resisted her inclination

to laugh, and went on.

“I want you to come and spend to-morrow with me, and I shall stop on my

way home at Mrs. Ashton’s to ask if Catharine may come with you.” In her

joy, Catharine nearly upset the _causeuse_, which rocked as if a little

earthquake were taking place under it. “But I came this morning

especially to tell you a piece of news.” At this, Catharine could hold

out no longer; not only her curly head, but her entire self, emerged

from concealment, and she slided, as she imagined, unobserved, into a

seat.

“We are going away for awhile, Ada,” resumed Mrs. Darrington, “and I

have various commissions to intrust to you. Will you do them?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I want you to take care of Hector and Fleeta,” continued Mrs.

Darrington.

Hector and Fleeta! Then James was going too! Ada longed to ask where,

and for how long, but she dared not; and Mrs. Darrington, seeing her

large eyes ready to overflow, merely added that they would speak more on

that subject on the morrow. She then spoke a few words to Catharine,

repeated her invitation, and drove off.

“Where are they going, mamma?” asked poor Ada, the moment Mrs.

Darrington left the room.

“To France, my love.”

“To France?” gasped Ada, to whom a voyage to Europe, or a voyage to the

North Pole, was equally terrific.

“Yes, dear,” said her mother, “and I am not surprised that you are sorry

to part with Mrs. Darrington and James, who are so kind to you.”

This at once relieved Ada from any obligation to contend with her grief;

and using her mother’s sympathy as a _carte blanche_ for any amount of

tears, she burst into a violent fit of crying, in which she was joined

by the sympathising Catharine. Mrs. Somers, not feeling disposed to make

a third in this _jérémiade_, left them to weep in concert, which they

did for some time _à qui mieux mieux_.

At length Ada dried her eyes, whereupon Catharine, who for some minutes

had been squeezing hers to little purpose, quickly did the same; and

after both had drawn a long breath, and had held up their handkerchiefs

to see how much they had cried, Catharine thought it time to administer

consolation.

“Never mind, Ada, when James is gone, brother George will ride with us.

He is coming home next month.”

Conceive this, ye who have loved! The audacity of one’s bosom friend

proposing some uninteresting brother as a substitute for one’s lover!

Ada was indignant, and forgetting the proof of friendship exhibited in

Catharine’s exceedingly wet handkerchief, she gave such strong vent to

her abhorrence of George, that a quarrel seemed unavoidable. At that

moment, however, a servant came to call them to dinner, where decency

forbade that Ada should be rude to her guest. At first the friends were

quite formal, but with each course disappeared one layer of reserve,

till the dessert was put on the table, when the desire to eat Philapænas

together was irresistible, and the first twin-almond found in Ada’s

plate restored peace.

The next day was spent with Mrs. Darrington. It passed in mingled joy

and grief; but it must be confessed that the former predominated. Late

in the afternoon, a procession, composed of James, Ada and Catharine,

escorted Hector and Fleeta to their new home.

At length came the parting-hour. The Darrington family spent their last

evening at Somerton; and Ada, though her father deposed that she had

spent the entire day in the cave of Trophonius, was somewhat revived by

the sight of Mrs. Darrington’s parting present. This was a beautiful

writing-desk of ebony, dainty enough to have served Seneca or Sir Philip

Sydney; for the inkstand, pen, pencil, and sand-box were, as Ada

triumphantly pointed out to Catharine, of “real gold.”

As for James’ gift, what could it be but a ring set in the form of a

Forget-me-not? And as he was a student of the classics, and had heard of

the ring of Polycrates, he chose an emerald. He attempted an explanation

of the resemblance between these two rings, which poor Ada vainly

endeavored to comprehend; and no wonder, as King Polycrates threw _his_

emerald to the sea, and James gave his to his sweetheart—but never

mind! an emerald was in question, and Ada had been picked up out of a

river; and as for the rest, why—the genius of sixteen is highly

imaginative.

That night Ada went to bed with her ring on her finger, and cried

herself to sleep. The next day the Darringtons sailed for Europe, and

she heard nothing of her friends until three years afterward, when

tidings arrived of the death of the American Minister at Paris, and the

removal of his widow and son to England. After that, the mention of

their names became less and less frequent; and when Hector and Fleeta

were gathered to their fathers, so little remained to remind Ada of her

lost playfellow, that she threw his ring into a box with old jewels, and

by and bye threw his memory to the winds.

And so ended the first love of Ada Somers.

* * * * *

THE SECOND LOVE OF ADA SOMERS.

CHAPTER I.

——Hasset noch weil sie nicht liebt.

SCHILLER.

Ten years have glided away since we left Ada in tears and pantalets, and

she has reached the mature age of twenty-three, “in maiden meditation

fancy free.” Not that she ever bestowed a thought upon her childhood’s

love—not that she lacked suitors either; for beautiful as one of

Domenichino’s dark-eyed sybils, and with too many of the incidental

endowments of fortune not to be worshiped for her wealth, if not for her

worth, Ada might have had admirers as many as she had thousands. But she

chose _not_ to have them; and they might as well have “loved a bright

particular star and hoped to wed it;” for Galatea would step from her

pedestal for none of them. Always graceful and high-bred, the only

charge brought against Ada by the sex who begin life by expecting to bag

women’s hearts as they bag pheasants, was, that she returned their

assiduities and their flattery with the utmost consummate indifference.

“Favors to none, to all she smiles” extended; but beyond that, no word,

look, or action ever gave evidence that the beautiful heiress regarded

men in any other than in the light of so many monads, representing

certain qualities of mind and soul, good or evil.

The men of —— were in amazement at such powers of resistance, when

they reflected upon the amount of fascination and worth resisted; and

Ada became as remarkable as the Rock of Gibraltar, not only in the eyes

of the baffled enemy, but in those of certain of her female

acquaintances, who, rather than die under the ban of old maidenhood,

would have married Bluebeard himself, and therefore looked upon

_man_kind as a race of husbands, “to be or not to be”—theirs.

But Ada was no Lydia Languish, and had no horror of being called a

spinster; neither saw she any thing so attractive in marriage that all

the world must go mad for it. Early in life, she had learned, as do all

little girls, her lesson of inferiority to a greater sex, and she grew

up with a vague idea of the sublimity and wisdom of man, and the folly

and ignorance of woman; but by and bye, as faith gave way to reason, she

discovered that the lords of the creation were, generally speaking, none

the wiser for their usurpation of the glorious privilege of praising God

with their intellects, but that three-fourths of this boasting race were

as frivolous as if, like woman, they had been all their lives shut out

from the Paradise of knowledge, and had not had possession of all the

learning of the earth for thousands of years. Moreover, Ada took an

exalted view of the condition of old maids; she considered it a position

which gave scope for the exercise of a wider philanthropy than is safe

or consistent with the duties of a wife and mother; and she wrought up

her enthusiasm for the vocation of the sisterhood to such a pitch, that

she made up her mind to become one of them. But,

“Varium et mutabile semper

Fæmina——”

So thought Catharine Ashton, when she heard of these resolves; for she

had grown up with very different opinions; and faithful to her

convictions, she was on the eve of being married, and wished for nothing

in the world so much as that her friend should be as happy as herself.

Catharine had spent two years in Europe, and although her lover, Charles

Ingleby, had always resided in ——, they met for the first time in

Germany, where Ingleby was spending the summer with a friend, whom

Catharine never wearied of lauding; for, like a true woman, she was

ready to take to her breast any thing and every thing that loved her

Charles; and between him and Mr. Stanley, there existed so warm a

friendship, that the latter had greatly hurried some business

transaction which detained him in Europe, to return in company with his

friend and his pretty _fiancée_.

Mr. Stanley was daily expected to perform the part of groomsman to the

lovers, and Ada Somers had been chosen to bear him company as bridemaid.

Ada and Mr. Ingleby were the best friends imaginable; and they had, from

their first interview, seemed so pleased with each other, as to cause

Catharine to hope that all was not yet lost for her poor friend. If she

had made so signal an exception in favor of her (Catharine’s) lover, as

to grant him the boon of her friendship, what might not be accomplished

by a high-minded and estimable man who offered _more_ than friendship?

Mr. Stanley, for instance.