"I never thought you unreasonable before, Ida."
"I am sorry you should now, Carry."
"How can I help it, when after travelling with us for weeks you
suddenly resolve to return to Eastern Virginia by yourself; and to that
lonesome place in the country, which you have not visited for years!"
"I have an escort; a gentleman who is on his way to Richmond, and will
take charge of me."
"But why this notion, just as we decided to go north? Has your
curiosity to behold Niagara diminished since your sight of 'the
Bridge?'"
"Frankly and truly, I do not care to see it. I would not ride to the
House Mountain yonder, if Mont Blanc, the Lake of Como, and the Great
Fall were to be seen from the other side."
"Do you hear that, Arthur?" said Carry, despairingly, to her husband,
who was reading.
"No--what is it?"
"This obstinate young lady is about to deprive us of the honour of her
company. She is going back to Staunton to-morrow."
"To the Lunatic Hospital?" inquired Arthur, putting aside his book.
"You are not in earnest, Ida? Are you tired of us; or do you dislike
our sketched route? If the last, we will alter it."
"And if the first, we will alter ourselves," interposed Carry,
laughingly.
"I would have you and your plans remain as they are. I am not well,
and require rest--not change. My desire to see old Sunnybank is not a
caprice, as Carry supposes; I have had it in contemplation for a long
time. Mr. Read deterred me from it by representations of the discomfort
I would encounter; the only white man left on the plantation being the
overseer. This summer he has been removed, and his place given to a
former tenant of mother's; a man of family; and the accommodations,
which serve for them, will keep me from hardship."
"She is sick," said Carry, when Ida retired. "She has not been herself
lately. Were it not that she is used to dissipation, I should think
that the round of parties, after our wedding, overtasked her strength.
Yet, she enjoyed them."
"Her malady may be of the mind," said Dr. Dana, thoughtfully. "Do you
consider this probable?"
"Oh, no! she was well and happy when she came to us; and what can have
occurred since to affect her?"
"You are right, I dare say;" returned he, absently. He was pondering
upon her behaviour after Charley's departure.
Argument did not dissuade, and conjecture was baffled in the effort
to explain this unexpected movement. They parted in Lexington--Ida
to recross the mountains eastward; they, to travel north by way of
Harper's Ferry.
If there is an enjoyment, which is purely of the intellect, its
usurpation is man's high prerogative; the sticklers for woman's "equal
rights" will never establish her title to it. The mind masculine may
be nourished and exercised, and attain its full size, while the heart
is dwarfed and sickly;--as with twin children, one sometimes grows to
man's stature, healthy and strong; and the other pines and dies in
childhood. In woman, intellect and the affections are united from their
birth;--like the Siamese brothers, one refuses food, which is denied
its companion; and who dare peril the life of both by severing the
ligament which joins them?
Ida's route was through the garden-spot of our State--the magnificent
Valley, with its heaven-bathed, impregnable eyries, among which
our country's Father selected a resting-place for Freedom's
standard--America's Thermopylae, should the invader's power drive him
from every other hold;--where one may travel for days, encircled by
the Briarean arms, the sister ridges stretch, in amity, towards each
other--each rolling its streams and clouds down to the verdant plains
between;--where morning and evening, the sun marshals his crimson and
gold-colored array upon the purple heights, which are coeval with
him and Time; and flings shadows and hues athwart them, in his day's
march, he never vouchsafes to Lowland countries;--and this region
was traversed with not a thought beyond a feverish wish to be at her
journey's end and rest. She stopped in Richmond but one night. Mr. Read
and his daughter were out of town, and she went to a hotel. At dawn
she was upon the road, with no attendant but the driver of her hack.
Rachel had gone to Sunnybank a month before, to see her relations,
little expecting her mistress to come for her. Ida's spirits and health
declined alarmingly, now that the necessity of eluding suspicion was
over. She had never been sick a day in her life; but she began to feel
that mental ills may be aggravated by bodily disease. The unnatural
tension had been maintained too long. When Sunnybank appeared, she was
unable to raise her head to look at it. The negroes flocked out at the
phenomenon of a travelling carriage in the disused avenue; and loud
were their astonishment and compassion, as they recognised its occupant.
"I have come home to die, mother," said she, as they lifted her out,
and fainted in their arms. In the midst of their consternation, the
family pride of the faithful underlings was stubborn. "Their young
mistress should not be carried to the overseer's;" and Aunt Judy, the
keeper of the keys, hurried off to unlock the house doors. Ida had
a cloudy remembrance of awakening in her mother's chamber, and of a
gleaming fancy, that she was once more a child, aroused from a horrid,
horrid dream, then her senses forsook her, and there was a wide hiatus
in memory. It was night when she awoke again; she was in the same
room;--a fire burned in the chimney, and cast fantastic shapes upon
the ceiling. Crouched in the corner of the fire-place, was a dusky
figure, whose audible breathing sounded loudly through the apartment.
Her slumbers were not very profound, however, for she sprang up at the
feeble call--"Rachel!"
"Miss Ida! honey! what do you want?"
"How long have I slept? my head feels so strange!"
"That's because you've been sick, honey."
"What is the matter with me?"
"Fever, dear--you caught it in them dreadful mountains, and have been
laid up for four weeks. But you'll git well, now--you were out of your
head 'most all the time--and the doctor says you mustn't talk."
Ida desisted, too weak to disobey. With vague curiosity, she followed
her with her eyes, as she smoothed the counterpane, pushed up the bed
on one side, and patted it down on the other; then she put the "chunks"
together upon the hearth, and there was the clinking of spoons and
glasses at a table.
"Here's your drink, Miss Ida," she said, lifting her head with a care
that proved her a practised nurse. It was cool and palatable, and the
heavy lids sank in natural slumber.
Mr. Grant (the overseer) and his wife had not been remiss in their
duty to the sick girl. She had the best medical attendance the county
afforded; and Mr. Read was written to at the commencement of the
attack; the letter was unanswered--probably not received. Rachel was
"sure Miss Jenny or Miss Carry would come in a minute, if they knew she
was sick;" but was ignorant of the address of either. Their nursing
might have been more skilful, but it could not have exceeded hers in
tenderness. She took turns with Mrs. Grant in watching, but she never
left the room except for her meals. She was amply repaid for her labor
of love by the improvement which henceforward was apparent in her
patient. Her raptures awoke no responsive harmony in Ida's bosom.
Her physician was a son of Mr. Hall, the old minister, who had gone to
his rest.
"You must exert yourself, Miss Ida," said he. "Have you walked yet?"
"No, sir."
"Cannot you do it?"
"I don't know, indeed, sir."
"But, my dear child, nature cannot do everything; we must aid her. It
is as binding upon us to save our own lives, as those of others."
"When they are worth saving."
"You want more powerful tonics than any I have;" said the doctor,
eyeing her curiously. "I must think your case over. I _command_ you to
walk across the room twice to-day, three times to-morrow, and so on.
See that she minds me, Rachel!"
Rachel gave her no peace, until she consented to sit up awhile in the
easy-chair, by the window. Sunnybank was sadly changed. The buildings
and enclosures were in good repair, and the fields cultivated; but
the walks and shrubbery were neglected; and the garden, into which Ida
was looking, overgrown with high weeds. Here and there a rose-tree
struggled for a foothold, a scanty growth of yellow leaves clinging to
the mossy stems; the sweetbrier still hung over the window, its long,
bare arms rattling in the cold wind like fleshless bones; the tangled
grass in the yard had run to seed, and piles of dead leaves were heaped
against the palings. She could not see the grave-yard; she knew,
though, that the willows were leafless, and how the sprays were waving
in their melancholy dance, and whispering their old song--"Alone!" If
alone then, how now? sick--dying, perhaps! where were those who had
proudly borne the name of friend? where the sister, in whose bosom she
had lain for months, and eased her sorrows and heightened her joys?
the brother, she had averred, was "all kindness and truth?" and oh!
where he, who had filled her heart to the brim with the rich, red
wine of life, to change, in a moment, to fiery, deadly poison! She
felt no resentment against him; she was too utterly broken-hearted,
she thought, even if she had cause; and she had not. Her wilful
self-deception had been her snare; instead of studying his heart, she
had judged it by her own. Were his candor--his undisguised interest in
her welfare, tokens of love, that ever seeks concealment? No! he had
tried to lead her, a wayward child, to the paths of happiness; and she
had seen nought but the hand which pointed the way. There was prophetic
meaning in Lynn's eye, when he spoke of "the finest growth of heart and
soul, which you flattered yourself were climbing heavenward, twining
with strengthening tendrils around the altar of that one love!" She had
been impious enough to imagine that she was imbibing a fondness for
holy things; her heart had burned within her, as he talked of the loved
theme; she had read the Scriptures, and prayed, in words, for light and
guidance. And by the fierce rebellion which fired her breast--rebellion
against--hatred of the Being, this lip service had blasphemed, she knew
that she had never bowed in soul to Him; and her heart--broken, though
she said it was,--trusting still--adoring still the mortal, through the
great love she bore him--yet reared itself in angry defiance, saying
to the Chastener,--"I will not submit!" What had she done, to be left
desolate--comfortless in the spring-time of life! "He is, they tell
me, merciful and all-powerful;--let Him give me back my love, and I
will believe in Him." And as day by day passed, and there were no
tidings of Carry or the Danas, she felt a morose complacency in the
confirmation of her hard thoughts of them, and in repeating, "I am not
humbled yet!"
"Uncle Will wants to know if he can come in to see you, Miss Ida," said
Rachel, one Sabbath afternoon.
Ida was dressed, and rocking herself listlessly before the fire. "Let
him come," she replied, languidly.
This man was her mother's steward and factotum; a hale, fine-looking
negro; better educated than the generality of his caste, and devotedly
pious. He brushed off a tear with the back of his hand, as his mistress
greeted him. He had not seen her since she was grown, and was moved by
her likeness to her mother.
"You would not have known me,--would you, uncle Will?" she asked.
"Yes ma'am; you are your mother's own child."
"Indeed! I am called like my father."
"You're like _her_, ma'am--in body, and like her in spirit, too I hope."
"No, Uncle Will, you cannot expect that;--she was an angel."
"Better than that, Mistis--she was a Christian!"
"And how is that better?" said Ida, surprised at the reply. "She is an
angel now--is she not?"
"No ma'am; she is one of the spirits of the just made perfect; and
according to my notion, that's better than to be a born seraph. Angels
may praise and glorify the Lamb, but they haven't so much to be
thankful for as we."
"I do not understand you. They have been happy from all Eternity;
and those who have lived in this world, have had sorrow and pain and
sin--'mourning all their days.'"
"They needn't, ma'am--
'Why should the children of a King
Go mourning all their days!'"
said Will readily--"He holds us up under whatever trouble we have;
unless we bring it upon ourselves by our transgressions, and He will
deliver us then, if we call to Him. The Saviour is the Christian's
glory and song--He didn't die for angels."
Ida mused. "There is a question I wish to ask you," said she. "God can
do as He pleases;--can He not?"
"Certainly, Mistis--'He worketh according to the counsel of His own
will.'"
"And He is very pitiful and gracious?" she continued.
"Like as a father pitieth his children, Mistis."
"Then when He knows that we are miserable and sinful and helpless, why
does not He take pity on us, and make us good and happy?"
"He will, ma'am."
"But He does not. He only waits for us to love anything, before He robs
us of it. So far from liking to see us happy, it would seem that He
grudged us the poor crumbs we picked up of ourselves."
"Because they ain't good for us, Mistis."
"Why did He allow us to take them, then? why wait, until we have tasted
and found them sweet, before He snatches them away?"
"I remember, Mistis, when you were a little thing, no higher than my
knee, you were mightily taken with some red peppers growing in the
garden. Your mother called you away from the bed, four or five times,
and ordered you not to touch them. By and by I spied you running down
the walk towards them, when you thought she didn't see you; and I was
starting in a hurry to fetch you back, but she stopped me. 'No, Will!'
says she, 'the punishment sin brings with it, is remembered longer than
a hundred warnings. She will have a useful lesson.' I was loath to have
you hurt; but I had to mind her. Your lesson was right hard; for your
mouth and face and hands were swelled and burning for hours. But you
didn't go near the pepper-bed again. And it seems to me, ma'am, that
the Almighty treats us just so. We run crazy after things, that are
like the red peppers,--pretty outside, but hot as fire when we get to
playing with them. He doesn't push us towards them--_He lets us alone_;
and we are mighty apt to run to Him, after we've got a fair taste. You
didn't know but your mother would whip you for disobeying her; but you
went straight to her when you felt the smart."
"This does not follow, of course, uncle Will. I have tasted some hot
peppers since those days; and I cannot see any mercy or use in the
lesson."
"Maybe you haven't asked an explanation, ma'am."
"From whom? from you?"
"No ma'am! From Him, unto whom belong the deep things of the Almighty.
And if He doesn't show you their meaning now--He will, sometime.
Children are often puzzled at their parents' dealings."
As he was leaving, she observed his wistful look.
"Have you any requests to make, uncle Will? you will not ask anything
unreasonable, I know."
"I hope not, ma'am. You see--we've been in the habit of holding our
Sunday night prayer-meetings in the basement-room, under this. We used
to meet there in your mother's time. She had the room fixed on purpose
for us. When it's clear weather, in summer, we meet out-doors;--it's
getting cool now--"
"And you are afraid of disturbing me; is that it?"
"Yes ma'am," said he, relieved.
"You may be quite easy as regards that. Has that room been ceiled yet?"
"No ma'am--'twould have been if--you all had stayed here."
"I am glad that it is not. I can hear your hymns--how I used to love
those old tunes! Have your meeting. I wish I had no other disturbance!"
He had got into the entry, when she recalled him; and with the sad
smile she had worn during their conversation, said, "Uncle Will! if you
think I have not done hankering after forbidden fruit, you may pray,
that I may be cured."
"I will, Mistis! God bless you!"
She had forgotten, and Will did not know, that all the services could
be heard through the floor. The worshippers assembled so quietly, that
she was not aware of this, until Will's tones startled her with the
idea that he was in the room. He commenced the exercises by reading the
fourteenth chapter of John's gospel. "Let not your hearts be troubled;
ye believe in God, believe also in me." He offered neither comment nor
explanation. He was a believer in what he called "the pure Word;"
"if I can't comprehend one part," he was wont to say, "I comfort
myself by thinking that there is so much that is plain even to my weak
understanding." The quavering voice of an aged man led in prayer; and
in spite of its verbiage and incorrect grammar, Ida listened, for it
was sincere. They sang in the sweet voices for which the race is so
remarkable,
"There is a land of pure delight,"
with a wild, beautiful chorus, repeated each time with more emphasis
and fervor--
"Oh sing to me of Heaven!
In Heaven alone, no sin is known,
And there's no parting there!"
Ida shut her eyes and lay motionless, lest she should lose a note.
Forgetful of her unholy enmity to her God--her distrust of her
kind--borne upon the melody her soul arose to Pisgah's top, and looked
yearningly upon the "sweet fields beyond the swelling flood," heard the
jubilant song of the redeemed--
"In Heaven alone, no sin is known,
And there's no parting there!"
A solemn hush followed; and Will said, "Let us pray." His deliberate
accents quickened into animation, with the unfolding of his petitions;
spurning the fetters of his imperfect speech, his thoughts clothed
themselves in the language of the Divine Word; coming to a King, be
adopted unconsciously the vernacular of princes. In speaking of Ida,
his manner was earnestly affectionate. "We beseech Thee, O Father, to
deal gently with thine handmaid, whom thou hast set over us in worldly
things. Thou hast seen fit that she should bear the yoke in her youth,
hast made her to possess wearisome nights, and days of vanity; hast
mingled her bread with tears, and her drink with weeping; Thou hast
taken from her father and mother,--the hope of her soul, and the desire
of her eyes; it is the Lord's doings, and it is marvellous in our eyes
and in hers. Lighten her eyes, Our Father! though weeping has endured
for a night, Thou hast promised that joy shall come in the morning;
tell her, that no affliction for the present seemeth joyous, but
grievous; but that Thou wilt make it work out for her an eternal weight
of glory; that whom Thou lovest Thou chasteneth, and upon Thy Blessed
Son Thou didst lay the afflictions and iniquities of us all. May her
hungry soul run to Him, from the far country in which she has been
living, and may He heal her broken bones, give her the oil of gladness
for mourning--the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness."
The hot, dry channel was broken up, and tears flowed in plenteous
measure. From the softening soul sprang her first real prayer. "Oh! be
my Father and Comforter!"
When Rachel awoke in the morning, she saw that her mistress had
unbarred the shutters of the window by her bed, and was reading. Her
face had a still deeper shade of gloom; but the attached girl drew a
favorable augury from this mark of interest in anything, except her own
thoughts. The book was a mother's gift--a Bible; she had read it with
tolerable regularity for the giver's sake, but she found herself now
lamentably ignorant of its contents. She read of the unapproachable
purity of the Immaculate, of judgment and justice; denunciation of the
wicked, and the "fearful looking for of vengeance" that remained to
rebellious children; in vain she searched it for a message to her--a
promise she could apply. Her alarm augmented, as the fruitlessness of
her endeavors became apparent. The life she had lightly esteemed was
inestimably dear, as she realised what eternity was; and her heart
was still with fear at the thought of the uncertain tenure by which
she held it. In times past she would have blushed at these shakings
of spirit; now she could not banish them. She would not be left alone
an instant; she was afraid to sleep, lest she should not awake in
time. She had said, "what evil have I done?" she saw now that she had
committed evil, and that continually; as she beheld "idolatry, hatred,
variance, emulation, wrath, envyings" in the same enumeration with
monstrous vices--a catalogue which brings to our ears the warring clash
of Pandemonium, rendered more horribly discordant by contrast with the
gentle music of "Love, joy, peace, long-suffering."
In angry despair she threw the volume aside; but tortured conscience
drove her to it again. "I _will_ be a Christian," was her primal
resolve,--as the terrors of the law flamed before her--"I _must_ be!"
and a week of labor and agony ended in a total sinking of hope, and an
exhausted cry, "I cannot!"
It was a calm Sabbath in the Indian Summer, and her chair was wheeled
to the door. The "summer's late, repentant smile" shone fondly upon the
landscape; the russet fields, the dismantled forests, the swift-rolling
river.
She had seen it look just so, often; when the breeze played among the
child's curls, and lent a quicker bound to a light heart--but faded
in body--prematurely old in spirit--she saw no beauty in earth--had
no treasure in heaven. Her Bible was upon her knees; she turned the
pages indolently, and was saying, for the hundredth time, "No hope!"
when a passage appeared to start up from the page. Could it have been
there while she sought it carefully and with tears? "The Lord hath
called thee as a woman, forsaken and grieved in spirit; and as a wife
of youth, when thou wast refused, saith my God. For a small moment
have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee; in a
little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with everlasting
kindness will I have mercy upon thee, saith the Lord, thy Redeemer.
* * * * Oh! thou afflicted, tossed with tempests, and not comforted!
behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colors, and lay thy foundations
with sapphires!"
As Will passed under the window on his way to Church, he was arrested
by an unusual sound. No one was visible, but his heart and eyes ran
over, as he recognised the voice that sang softly--
"Other refuge have I none,
Hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, oh! leave me not alone,
Still support and comfort me.
All my trust on Thee is stayed,
All my help from Thee I bring;
Cover my defenceless head
With the shadow of Thy wing."