contained a strict injunction of secrecy, asserting that if it were
ascertained that such an epistle had been despatched from such a
quarter, it would be attended with the total ruin of the writer.
It is true that Dwyer, many years after, when this letter came to light,
alleged it to be a forgery, an assertion whose truth, even to his dying
hour, and long after he had apparently ceased to feel the lash of public
scorn, he continued obstinately to maintain. Indeed this matter is full
of mystery, for, revenge alone excepted, which I believe, in such
minds as Dwyer's, seldom overcomes the sense of interest, the only
intelligible motive which could have prompted him to such an act was the
hope that since he had, through young O'Mara's interest, procured
from the colonel a lease of a small farm upon the terms which he had
originally stipulated, he might prosecute his plan touching the property
of Martin Heathcote, rendering his daughter's hand free by the removal
of young O'Mara. This appears to me too complicated a plan of villany
to have entered the mind even of such a man as Dwyer. I must, therefore,
suppose his motives to have originated out of circumstances connected
with this story which may not have come to my ear, and perhaps never
will.
Colonel O'Mara felt the death of his son more deeply than I should have
thought possible; but that son had been the last being who had continued
to interest his cold heart. Perhaps the pride which he felt in his child
had in it more of selfishness than of any generous feeling. But, be this
as it may, the melancholy circumstances connected with Ellen Heathcote
had reached him, and his conduct towards her proved, more strongly than
anything else could have done, that he felt keenly and justly, and, to a
certain degree, with a softened heart, the fatal event of which she had
been, in some manner, alike the cause and the victim.
He evinced not towards her, as might have been expected, any
unreasonable resentment. On the contrary, he exhibited great
consideration, even tenderness, for her situation; and having
ascertained where his son had placed her, he issued strict orders that
she should not be disturbed, and that the fatal tidings, which had not
yet reached her, should be withheld until they might be communicated in
such a way as to soften as much as possible the inevitable shock.
These last directions were acted upon too scrupulously and too long;
and, indeed, I am satisfied that had the event been communicated at
once, however terrible and overwhelming the shock might have been, much
of the bitterest anguish, of sickening doubts, of harassing suspense,
would have been spared her, and the first tempestuous burst of sorrow
having passed over, her chastened spirit might have recovered its tone,
and her life have been spared. But the mistaken kindness which concealed
from her the dreadful truth, instead of relieving her mind of a burden
which it could not support, laid upon it a weight of horrible fears
and doubts as to the affection of O'Mara, compared with which even the
certainty of his death would have been tolerable.
One evening I had just seated myself beside a cheerful turf fire, with
that true relish which a long cold ride through a bleak and shelterless
country affords, stretching my chilled limbs to meet the genial
influence, and imbibing the warmth at every pore, when my comfortable
meditations were interrupted by a long and sonorous ringing at the
door-bell evidently effected by no timid hand.
A messenger had arrived to request my attendance at the Lodge--such was
the name which distinguished a small and somewhat antiquated building,
occupying a peculiarly secluded position among the bleak and heathy
hills which varied the surface of that not altogether uninteresting
district, and which had, I believe, been employed by the keen and hardy
ancestors of the O'Mara family as a convenient temporary residence
during the sporting season.
Thither my attendance was required, in order to administer to a deeply
distressed lady such comforts as an afflicted mind can gather from the
sublime hopes and consolations of Christianity.
I had long suspected that the occupant of this sequestered, I might
say desolate, dwelling-house was the poor girl whose brief story we are
following; and feeling a keen interest in her fate--as who that had ever
seen her DID NOT?--I started from my comfortable seat with more eager
alacrity than, I will confess it, I might have evinced had my duty
called me in another direction.
In a few minutes I was trotting rapidly onward, preceded by my guide,
who urged his horse with the remorseless rapidity of one who seeks by
the speed of his progress to escape observation. Over roads and through
bogs we splashed and clattered, until at length traversing the brow of
a wild and rocky hill, whose aspect seemed so barren and forbidding that
it might have been a lasting barrier alike to mortal sight and step, the
lonely building became visible, lying in a kind of swampy flat, with a
broad reedy pond or lake stretching away to its side, and backed by a
farther range of monotonous sweeping hills, marked with irregular
lines of grey rock, which, in the distance, bore a rude and colossal
resemblance to the walls of a fortification.
Riding with undiminished speed along a kind of wild horse-track, we
turned the corner of a high and somewhat ruinous wall of loose stones,
and making a sudden wheel we found ourselves in a small quadrangle,
surmounted on two sides by dilapidated stables and kennels, on another
by a broken stone wall, and upon the fourth by the front of the lodge
itself.
The whole character of the place was that of dreary desertion and
decay, which would of itself have predisposed the mind for melancholy
impressions. My guide dismounted, and with respectful attention held
my horse's bridle while I got down; and knocking at the door with the
handle of his whip, it was speedily opened by a neatly-dressed female
domestic, and I was admitted to the interior of the house, and conducted
into a small room, where a fire in some degree dispelled the cheerless
air, which would otherwise have prevailed to a painful degree throughout
the place.
I had been waiting but for a very few minutes when another female
servant, somewhat older than the first, entered the room. She made some
apology on the part of the person whom I had come to visit, for the
slight delay which had already occurred, and requested me further to
wait for a few minutes longer, intimating that the lady's grief was so
violent, that without great effort she could not bring herself to speak
calmly at all. As if to beguile the time, the good dame went on in a
highly communicative strain to tell me, amongst much that could not
interest me, a little of what I had desired to hear. I discovered that
the grief of her whom I had come to visit was excited by the sudden
death of a little boy, her only child, who was then lying dead in his
mother's chamber.
'And the mother's name?' said I, inquiringly.
The woman looked at me for a moment, smiled, and shook her head with
the air of mingled mystery and importance which seems to say, 'I am
unfathomable.' I did not care to press the question, though I suspected
that much of her apparent reluctance was affected, knowing that my
doubts respecting the identity of the person whom I had come to visit
must soon be set at rest, and after a little pause the worthy Abigail
went on as fluently as ever. She told me that her young mistress had
been, for the time she had been with her--that was, for about a year
and a half--in declining health and spirits, and that she had loved her
little child to a degree beyond expression--so devotedly that she could
not, in all probability, survive it long.
While she was running on in this way the bell rang, and signing me to
follow, she opened the room door, but stopped in the hall, and taking me
a little aside, and speaking in a whisper, she told me, as I valued the
life of the poor lady, not to say one word of the death of young O'Mara.
I nodded acquiescence, and ascending a narrow and ill-constructed
staircase, she stopped at a chamber door and knocked.
'Come in,' said a gentle voice from within, and, preceded by my
conductress, I entered a moderately-sized, but rather gloomy chamber.
There was but one living form within it--it was the light and graceful
figure of a young woman. She had risen as I entered the room; but owing
to the obscurity of the apartment, and to the circumstance that her
face, as she looked towards the door, was turned away from the light,
which found its way in dimly through the narrow windows, I could not
instantly recognise the features.
'You do not remember me, sir?' said the same low, mournful voice. 'I
am--I WAS--Ellen Heathcote.'
'I do remember you, my poor child,' said I, taking her hand; 'I do
remember you very well. Speak to me frankly--speak to me as a friend.
Whatever I can do or say for you, is yours already; only speak.'
'You were always very kind, sir, to those--to those that WANTED
kindness.'
The tears were almost overflowing, but she checked them; and as if
an accession of fortitude had followed the momentary weakness,
she continued, in a subdued but firm tone, to tell me briefly the
circumstances of her marriage with O'Mara. When she had concluded the
recital, she paused for a moment; and I asked again:
'Can I aid you in any way--by advice or otherwise?'
'I wish, sir, to tell you all I have been thinking about,' she
continued. 'I am sure, sir, that Master Richard loved me once--I am sure
he did not think to deceive me; but there were bad, hard-hearted people
about him, and his family were all rich and high, and I am sure he
wishes NOW that he had never, never seen me. Well, sir, it is not in
my heart to blame him. What was _I_ that I should look at him?--an
ignorant, poor, country girl--and he so high and great, and so
beautiful. The blame was all mine--it was all my fault; I could not
think or hope he would care for me more than a little time. Well, sir,
I thought over and over again that since his love was gone from me for
ever, I should not stand in his way, and hinder whatever great thing
his family wished for him. So I thought often and often to write him
a letter to get the marriage broken, and to send me home; but for one
reason, I would have done it long ago: there was a little child, his and
mine--the dearest, the loveliest.' She could not go on for a minute or
two. 'The little child that is lying there, on that bed; but it is dead
and gone, and there is no reason NOW why I should delay any more about
it.'
She put her hand into her breast, and took out a letter, which she
opened. She put it into my hands. It ran thus:
'DEAR MASTER RICHARD,
'My little child is dead, and your
happiness is all I care about now. Your marriage with me is displeasing
to your family, and I would be a burden to you, and in your way in the
fine places, and among the great friends where you must be. You ought,
therefore, to break the marriage, and I will sign whatever YOU wish, or
your family. I will never try to blame you, Master Richard--do not think
it--for I never deserved your love, and must not complain now that I
have lost it; but I will always pray for you, and be thinking of you
while I live.'
While I read this letter, I was satisfied that so far from adding to the
poor girl's grief, a full disclosure of what had happened would, on the
contrary, mitigate her sorrow, and deprive it of its sharpest sting.
'Ellen,' said I solemnly, 'Richard O'Mara was never unfaithful to you;
he is now where human reproach can reach him no more.'
As I said this, the hectic flush upon her cheek gave place to a paleness
so deadly, that I almost thought she would drop lifeless upon the spot.
'Is he--is he dead, then?' said she, wildly.
I took her hand in mine, and told her the sad story as best I could. She
listened with a calmness which appeared almost unnatural, until I
had finished the mournful narration. She then arose, and going to the
bedside, she drew the curtain and gazed silently and fixedly on the
quiet face of the child: but the feelings which swelled at her heart
could not be suppressed; the tears gushed forth, and sobbing as if her
heart would break, she leant over the bed and took the dead child in her
arms.
She wept and kissed it, and kissed it and wept again, in grief so
passionate, so heartrending, as to draw bitter tears from my eyes. I
said what little I could to calm her--to have sought to do more would
have been a mockery; and observing that the darkness had closed in,
I took my leave and departed, being favoured with the services of my
former guide.
I expected to have been soon called upon again to visit the poor
girl; but the Lodge lay beyond the boundary of my parish, and I felt a
reluctance to trespass upon the precincts of my brother minister, and a
certain degree of hesitation in intruding upon one whose situation was
so very peculiar, and who would, I had no doubt, feel no scruple in
requesting my attendance if she desired it.
A month, however, passed away, and I did not hear anything of Ellen. I
called at the Lodge, and to my inquiries they answered that she was very
much worse in health, and that since the death of the child she had been
sinking fast, and so weak that she had been chiefly confined to her bed.
I sent frequently to inquire, and often called myself, and all that I
heard convinced me that she was rapidly sinking into the grave.
Late one night I was summoned from my rest, by a visit from the person
who had upon the former occasion acted as my guide; he had come to
summon me to the death-bed of her whom I had then attended. With
all celerity I made my preparations, and, not without considerable
difficulty and some danger, we made a rapid night-ride to the Lodge, a
distance of five miles at least. We arrived safely, and in a very short
time--but too late.
I stood by the bed upon which lay the once beautiful form of Ellen
Heathcote. The brief but sorrowful trial was past--the desolate mourner
was gone to that land where the pangs of grief, the tumults of passion,
regrets and cold neglect, are felt no more. I leant over the lifeless
face, and scanned the beautiful features which, living, had wrought such
magic on all that looked upon them. They were, indeed, much wasted; but
it was impossible for the fingers of death or of decay altogether
to obliterate the traces of that exquisite beauty which had so
distinguished her. As I gazed on this most sad and striking spectacle,
remembrances thronged fast upon my mind, and tear after tear fell upon
the cold form that slept tranquilly and for ever.
A few days afterwards I was told that a funeral had left the Lodge
at the dead of night, and had been conducted with the most scrupulous
secrecy. It was, of course, to me no mystery.
Heathcote lived to a very advanced age, being of that hard mould which
is not easily impressionable. The selfish and the hard-hearted survive
where nobler, more generous, and, above all, more sympathising natures
would have sunk for ever.
Dwyer certainly succeeded in extorting, I cannot say how, considerable
and advantageous leases from Colonel O'Mara; but after his death he
disposed of his interest in these, and having for a time launched into a
sea of profligate extravagance, he became bankrupt, and for a long time
I totally lost sight of him.
The rebellion of '98, and the events which immediately followed, called
him forth from his lurking-places, in the character of an informer; and
I myself have seen the hoary-headed, paralytic perjurer, with a scowl
of derision and defiance, brave the hootings and the execrations of the
indignant multitude.
STRANGE EVENT IN THE LIFE OF SCHALKEN THE PAINTER.
Being a Seventh Extract from the Legacy of the late Francis
Purcell, P. P. of Drumcoolagh.
You will no doubt be surprised, my dear friend, at the subject of the
following narrative. What had I to do with Schalken, or Schalken with
me? He had returned to his native land, and was probably dead and
buried, before I was born; I never visited Holland nor spoke with a
native of that country. So much I believe you already know. I must,
then, give you my authority, and state to you frankly the ground upon
which rests the credibility of the strange story which I am, about to
lay before you.
I was acquainted, in my early days, with a Captain Vandael, whose father
had served King William in the Low Countries, and also in my own unhappy
land during the Irish campaigns. I know not how it happened that I liked
this man's society, spite of his politics and religion: but so it was;
and it was by means of the free intercourse to which our intimacy gave
rise that I became possessed of the curious tale which you are about to
hear.
I had often been struck, while visiting Vandael, by a remarkable
picture, in which, though no connoisseur myself, I could not fail to
discern some very strong peculiarities, particularly in the distribution
of light and shade, as also a certain oddity in the design itself, which
interested my curiosity. It represented the interior of what might be a
chamber in some antique religious building--the foreground was occupied
by a female figure, arrayed in a species of white robe, part of which is
arranged so as to form a veil. The dress, however, is not strictly that
of any religious order. In its hand the figure bears a lamp, by whose
light alone the form and face are illuminated; the features are marked
by an arch smile, such as pretty women wear when engaged in successfully
practising some roguish trick; in the background, and, excepting where
the dim red light of an expiring fire serves to define the form, totally
in the shade, stands the figure of a man equipped in the old fashion,
with doublet and so forth, in an attitude of alarm, his hand being
placed upon the hilt of his sword, which he appears to be in the act of
drawing.
'There are some pictures,' said I to my friend, 'which impress one, I
know not how, with a conviction that they represent not the mere ideal
shapes and combinations which have floated through the imagination
of the artist, but scenes, faces, and situations which have actually
existed. When I look upon that picture, something assures me that I
behold the representation of a reality.'
Vandael smiled, and, fixing his eyes upon the painting musingly, he
said:
'Your fancy has not deceived you, my good friend, for that picture is
the record, and I believe a faithful one, of a remarkable and mysterious
occurrence. It was painted by Schalken, and contains, in the face of the
female figure, which occupies the most prominent place in the design,
an accurate portrait of Rose Velderkaust, the niece of Gerard Douw, the
first and, I believe, the only love of Godfrey Schalken. My father knew
the painter well, and from Schalken himself he learned the story of
the mysterious drama, one scene of which the picture has embodied. This
painting, which is accounted a fine specimen of Schalken's style, was
bequeathed to my father by the artist's will, and, as you have observed,
is a very striking and interesting production.'
I had only to request Vandael to tell the story of the painting in order
to be gratified; and thus it is that I am enabled to submit to you a
faithful recital of what I heard myself, leaving you to reject or to
allow the evidence upon which the truth of the tradition depends, with
this one assurance, that Schalken was an honest, blunt Dutchman, and,
I believe, wholly incapable of committing a flight of imagination; and
further, that Vandael, from whom I heard the story, appeared firmly
convinced of its truth.
There are few forms upon which the mantle of mystery and romance
could seem to hang more ungracefully than upon that of the uncouth and
clownish Schalken--the Dutch boor--the rude and dogged, but most cunning
worker in oils, whose pieces delight the initiated of the present day
almost as much as his manners disgusted the refined of his own; and yet
this man, so rude, so dogged, so slovenly, I had almost said so savage,
in mien and manner, during his after successes, had been selected by
the capricious goddess, in his early life, to figure as the hero of a
romance by no means devoid of interest or of mystery.
Who can tell how meet he may have been in his young days to play the
part of the lover or of the hero--who can say that in early life he had
been the same harsh, unlicked, and rugged boor that, in his maturer age,
he proved--or how far the neglected rudeness which afterwards marked
his air, and garb, and manners, may not have been the growth of that
reckless apathy not unfrequently produced by bitter misfortunes and
disappointments in early life?
These questions can never now be answered.
We must content ourselves, then, with a plain statement of facts, or
what have been received and transmitted as such, leaving matters of
speculation to those who like them.
When Schalken studied under the immortal Gerard Douw, he was a young
man; and in spite of the phlegmatic constitution and unexcitable manner
which he shared, we believe, with his countrymen, he was not incapable
of deep and vivid impressions, for it is an established fact that the
young painter looked with considerable interest upon the beautiful niece
of his wealthy master.
Rose Velderkaust was very young, having, at the period of which we
speak, not yet attained her seventeenth year, and, if tradition speaks
truth, possessed all the soft dimpling charms of the fail; light-haired
Flemish maidens. Schalken had not studied long in the school of Gerard
Douw, when he felt this interest deepening into something of a keener
and intenser feeling than was quite consistent with the tranquillity of
his honest Dutch heart; and at the same time he perceived, or thought he
perceived, flattering symptoms of a reciprocity of liking, and this
was quite sufficient to determine whatever indecision he might have
heretofore experienced, and to lead him to devote exclusively to her
every hope and feeling of his heart. In short, he was as much in love as
a Dutchman could be. He was not long in making his passion known to
the pretty maiden herself, and his declaration was followed by a
corresponding confession upon her part.
Schalken, however, was a poor man, and he possessed no counterbalancing
advantages of birth or position to induce the old man to consent to
a union which must involve his niece and ward in the strugglings and
difficulties of a young and nearly friendless artist. He was, therefore,
to wait until time had furnished him with opportunity, and accident with
success; and then, if his labours were found sufficiently lucrative, it
was to be hoped that his proposals might at least be listened to by her
jealous guardian. Months passed away, and, cheered by the smiles of the
little Rose, Schalken's labours were redoubled, and with such effect and
improvement as reasonably to promise the realisation of his hopes,
and no contemptible eminence in his art, before many years should have
elapsed.
The even course of this cheering prosperity was, however, destined to
experience a sudden and formidable interruption, and that, too, in a
manner so strange and mysterious as to baffle all investigation, and
throw upon the events themselves a shadow of almost supernatural horror.
Schalken had one evening remained in the master's studio considerably
longer than his more volatile companions, who had gladly availed
themselves of the excuse which the dusk of evening afforded, to withdraw
from their several tasks, in order to finish a day of labour in the
jollity and conviviality of the tavern.