THE promised visit to Powhatan was paid in July.
“How happily the days of Thalaba went by!”
I said over the strangely musical line to myself scores of times in the
two months of my stay in the dear old county. “Homestead,” the home of
the D.’s, was never more beautiful, and the days were full of innocent
fun, and junketings without number. College and University boys were at
home, and city people were flocking to the country. There were walks,
drives, “dining-days,” early and late horseback parties, setting out
from one hospitable house before sunrise, and breakfasting at another
ten or twelve miles away; or, better yet, leaving home at sunset, and
pacing, cantering, and galloping (women never rode trotting horses)
along highroad and plantation lane to a house, buried in ancestral
woods, in the very heart of the county, for supper, returning by the
light of the harvest moon, as fresh as when we set forth. With no
premonition that this was to be the most eventful summer and autumn of
my hitherto tranquil life, I gave myself up, wholly and happily, to the
influences that sweetened and glorified it.
Late in August I resolved rather suddenly to go home. My sister was
in Boston; my father would not leave his business for so much as a
week; my mother and the younger children ought to be in the country.
Since she would not resign my father to what she spoke of as “Fate and
servants,” I would throw my now rejuvenated body into the breach,
abide by the stuff and her husband and sons, while she took a sadly
needed rest with old friends in Nottoway County.
Recollecting how persistently I clung to the decision in the face of a
tempest of protest, my own heart in secret league with the protestants,
I acknowledge with humble gratitude the guidance of the “moving finger
that writes” out the destinies we think to control for ourselves.
The glow of the halcyon summer had not passed from my spirit when I
wrote to my late hostess two days after my return:
“RICHMOND, _August 29th, 1854._
“MY OWN FRIEND,—I said ‘I will write next week,’ but it
suits my feelings and convenience to write this morning.
“In the first place, my heart is so full of happiness
that it overflows upon and toward everybody that I love,
and don’t you dear Homesteadians—yourself and Powhie,
especially—come in for a share?
“Mrs. Noble was very pleasant, but the journey was a bit
tedious. It always is! Richmond looked enchanting when at
last the spires and chimneys appeared upon the horizon, and
my sweet home was never so pretty before.
“Mother had planned an agreeable surprise, and not told
me that the painters had been at work elsewhere than in
my room. So the freshly painted shutters and the white
window-facings and cornices, contrasted with the gray
walls, were doubly beautiful, because not expected. Then
Percy came tumbling down the steps, clapping his hands and
shouting in glee, and Alice’s bright smile shone upon me at
the gate, and mother left company in the parlor to give me
four kisses—and all I could say was, ‘I have had _such_ a
pleasant visit, and now I am _so_ glad to see you all!’
“Father could not be coaxed to bed that night until one
o’clock, although mother reminded him that he had a headache.
“‘Never mind! Daughters don’t come home every night!’
“‘But this one will be tired out!’
“‘Well, she may sleep late to-morrow morning.’
“He doesn’t know how lazy I have grown of late.
“I am surprised to find vegetation so luxuriant here. My
inquiries concerning the ‘late drought’ are answered by a
stare of amazement. Rain has been abundant in this region.
In our garden the vegetables and grape-vines grow rank and
tall. And as for flowers! There were seven bouquets in
the parlor, smiling and breathing a welcome. Last night I
received one per rail from Horace Lacy (bless his soul!),
and Herbert to-night brought up another and a magnificent,
when he came to his late supper.
“Mother had delicious peaches for supper the night I got
back, but advised me to ‘eat them sparingly, at first.’
Yesterday I forgot her caution, and I think I am the better
for the lapse. Peaches, watermelons, apples, sweet potatoes,
etc., were liberally patronized by us all. The cholera
‘scare’ seems to be over. Doctor Haxall advised the members
of our family to make no change in their diet while they
continued well, and they have prospered wonderfully under
his regimen....
“I wish I had time to tell you of some queer letters I found
waiting for me. Father would not forward them, ‘for fear
of annoying me.’ They are meant to be complimentary, one
requesting ‘some particulars of your birthplace, education,’
etc. ‘Wish he may get them!’
“Now, dear, forgive this egotistical scrawl—written as fast
as fingers can scratch—but just seat yourself and tell me
exactly what you have been doing, saying, and thinking
since I left; how our pet, Powhie (the dear old scamp!), is
thriving; and the state of your mother’s health, also the
news from The Jungle.
“Our Heavenly Father bless and love you, my darling!”
We packed my mother and her younger children off to the country the
first of September, and rejoiced unselfishly that they had escaped the
fervid heats of the following week. Our house was deliciously cool by
comparison with the sultriness of the outer world. The thick walls
and lofty ceilings kept the temperature at an equable and comfortable
point. We breakfasted early, and by nine o’clock the day was my own—or
six consecutive hours of it.
In unconscious imitation of Charlotte Brontë, who began _Jane Eyre_
while _The Professor_ was “plodding his weary round from publisher to
publisher,” I had begun another book by the time _Alone_ was turned
over to the tender mercies of Mr. Morris’s “reader.” I finished the
first draught on the forenoon of September 11th, having wrought at it
with the fierce joy in work that ever comes to me after a season of
absolute or comparative idleness.