I sold my forge and went to the city. My name appeared in the catalogue
of the fall exhibition:--"Forest Scene, by Alexander Allen." I have no
reason to suppose that the genuine merit of my picture secured for it a
place in the gallery, though doubtless some as poor by established
artists found their way there; but these having proved they could do
better could afford to be found occasionally below concert pitch.
However, Mr. Leopold commended it as highly as his conscience would
permit, and I reaped the reward; while Miss Darry gloried over its
admission as an unalloyed tribute to ability, and treasured the
catalogue more carefully than my photograph. The same course of study
and labor which I had pursued in Warren was continued in the city, with
this difference: I had not the pure air, simple food, regular life,
manual exertion, or social evenings at Hillside. Miss Darry wrote to me
regularly, but I felt wearied after her letters. There were no tender
assurances of undying affection, so soothing, doubtless, to tired brain
and heavy heart; but they read somewhat in this style:--
"MY DEAR SANDY,--Won't you begin at once a course of German
reading? 'Das Leben Jesu' of Strauss will help you
wonderfully. The old Platonic philosophers have done you
some good; but you have a faith too childlike, a complete
reliance upon Providence quite too unreasoning, for a man of
your ability. Through your own developed self you must learn
to find the Supreme Intelligence,--not to spell him out
letter by letter in every flower that grows, every trifling
event of your life. You began with belief in the old
theological riddle of the Trinity; then with perception of
the Creator in his visible world; but to your Naturalism you
must add at least a knowledge of Mysticism,
Transcendentalism,--mists which, veiling indeed the outward
creation, are interpenetrated by the sun for personal
illumination, more alluring by their veiled light, like
those sunned fogs Mr. Leopold deals with occasionally, than
the clear every-day atmosphere of beliefs sharply outlined
by a creed. When you have sounded the entire scale of
prevailing and past theories, even to the depths of
unbelief, then alone are you able, as a reasoning being, to
translate God's dealings with you into consistent religious
faith."
And ended often with,--
"I hope you work hard, intensely, in your art. Do not think,
when you lay aside your brush, you lay aside the artist
also. Genius is unresting. A picture may shape itself in
your brain at any hour, by day or night; and don't be too
indolent, my dear boy, to give it outward embodiment, if it
does."
"I was sadly disappointed at the result of the last," she wrote once.
"Mr. Lang showed it to Mr. Peterson, the sculptor, who pronounced it
slightly below the average first attempts. Of course, from your devotion
to coloring, you did not feel sufficiently interested to put forth all
your powers; still I accept the trial as a proof of your affection.
Having greater genius for painting, you could certainly succeed in
sculpture, nevertheless, if you heartily labored at it. I could never
accept the definition of genius given by the author of 'Rab and his
Friends,' which limits it, if I remember rightly, to an especial
aptitude for some one pursuit. Genius is a tremendous force, not
necessarily to succeed only in one channel, although turned to one by
natural bent."
* * * * *
Little Annie, at my earnest request, wrote to me occasionally. It was a
brief parting with her: she feared her own self-control, possibly. I
know I feared mine; for, had she showed actual grief, I might have
pacified it at the cost of my profession or my life. She wrote in this
wise:--
"DEAR SANDY,--I know of course you are very busy, for Miss
Darry told me at Hillside that your painting was in the
Exhibition, and that you were rapidly becoming a great
artist; and this makes me think I ought to confess to you,
Sandy, that I was wrong that morning when I called Miss
Darry proud. She has been very kind to me lately. She said
it was not right that I should be taught music, and all
sorts of lovely, pleasant studies, and not know how to write
and cipher. So she teaches me with Mrs. Lang's sisters. She
says I already express myself better than I did, and I can
cast up father's account-book every Saturday night; but
please forgive me, dear brother Sandy, I long for that stiff
old work-hour to be over, that I may run up to Mrs. Lang's
sun-shiny room, with its flowers, pictures, piano, and
herself. Miss Darry, because of her very great talents,
Sandy, is far above me. Do you know, though you are to be a
great painter, she seems to me more talented than you, with
your old home-like ways? But then we sha'n't have those
home-like ways any more. Oh, Sandy, we miss you! but I do
hope you will be good and great and happy. Miss Darry says
you work night and day. But you must sleep some, or you'll
be sick. I always fancied great men were born great; it must
be hard to have to be made so. I guess you will be glad to
hear that father don't swear and scold now; he says he is
doing well, and he bought me a new dress the other day at
Miss Dinsmore's. She has got back from the city with the
gayest flowers and ribbons. My dress is orange-colored. I
don't fancy one quite so bright, and wear the old violet one
you gave me oftener; but I can't exactly see why I don't
like it, after all; for the very same color, on the breast
of the Golden Oriole that builds a nest in our garden, I
think is perfectly splendid. I hope you won't forget your
loving little sister,
"ANNIE BRAY."
Sometimes she wrote less brightly and hopefully; but, oh, what a
blessing it was to have her write at all! I found myself watching for
those natural, loving words, for the acknowledgment of missing me, as,
wearied after viewing Alpine peaks, one might stoop cheered and
satisfied to pluck a tiny flower. Miss Darry never missed me. She
discouraged the idea of a long autumn vacation, and offered to come to
the city and board, that my work might still go on. I began to entertain
serious doubts, if, when we were married, I should be suffered to live
with her,--or whether she would not send me to boarding-school, or to
pursue my studies abroad.
When October came, with the rich sadness of its days, at once a prophecy
of grief and an assurance of its soothing, I broke down utterly. My
aesthetic and literary friends did not feel that sympathy for my worn-out
body and soul which both demanded. I applied to the only legitimate
source for aid in my weakness and the permission to yield to it; but
before either arrived, Nature proved more than a match for Miss Darry,
and sent me exhausted to bed. Miss Darry appeared the next morning, and
if the whole breezy atmosphere of Hillside had clung to her garments,
she could not have had a more bracing effect. How bright, loving, and
gentle she was, when she found me really ill! To be sure, she prescribed
vigorous tonics, as was in accordance with her style; in fact, she was
one herself; but she relieved my weak and languid dejection by brilliant
talk, when I could bear it,--by tender words of hope, when I could not.
My late internal censures upon her, as a hard task-mistress, were now
the ghosts of self-reproach, which a morbid condition conjured about my
pillow; and the vision of her healthy, self-restrained nature presided
over every dream, recalling most derisively Mr. Leopold's simile of the
pine- and peach-trees.
I left my bed, from very shame at prostration, long before I was able,
and returned with her to Hillside, whither Mrs. and Mr. Lang invited me
for the rest which she now considered necessary. Mr. Leopold had left
Warren, and retaken a studio in town for the fall and winter; but many a
memory of his kind deeds and pleasant manners lingered in the place.
Every village must have its hero, its great man of past or present,
looking down, like Hawthorne's great stone face, in supreme benignity
upon it. Mr. Leopold had been the first occupant of this royal chair in
Warren; for the enthusiasm which seeks a better than itself had just
been called forth by the teaching and influence of Hillside.
One morning, when Miss Darry was occupied with her scholars, I wandered
through the village and to the Brays' cottage to make my first call.
Mrs. Bray was busy making cake. Annie, so tall and slender, that, as she
stood with her face turned from me, I wondered what graceful young lady
they had there, was prepared for her walk to Hillside, her books in a
little satchel on her arm. Her eyes filled with tears at the sight of my
thin, pale face, though her own was fragile as a snow-drop; but she at
once apologized for and explained her sorrow by calling me her "dear old
brother Sandy." I proposed one of our old-time strolls together up the
hill, and we soon started in company. Half way up, at the meadow, where
we had arranged and painted our first picture, I yielded to the impulse,
which heretofore I had resisted, to sit again on the old stump and
recall the scene. I was really weary, for this was my first long walk,
and Annie looked as though rest would not come amiss; so I helped her
over the stile, and we sat down. The rich, fervid hues I used so
homoeopathically by the stroke of my brush were spread over miles of
forest; a vaporous veil of mist hung over every winding stream and
mountain lake, and, reflecting the brilliant-colored shrubbery which
bordered them, they glared like stained glass; the sunshine filtered
down through haze and vapor like gold-dust on the meadow-land; gold and
purple key-notes of autumn coloring in many varying shades of tree,
water, and cloud blended to the perfect chord, uttering themselves
lastly most quietly in the golden-rods and asters at our feet. That
hazy, dreamy atmosphere uniting with my vague, aimless state of mind, I
would fain make it accountable for the talk which followed.
First we went over the old times, I recalling, Annie assenting in a
quiet, half-sad way, or brightening as though by an effort, and throwing
in a reminiscence herself. We talked of those we had mutually known, and
I was just recalling the rude admiration of Tracy Waters to her mind,
when she suggested that she should be late for her lesson,--it was time
to leave.
"No, indeed, Annie!" I exclaimed, seizing her hand as she sat beside
me,--"this is the first hour's actual rest I have had for months; it is
like the returning sleep of health after delirium. You shall not go.
When have I ever had you to myself before? The time is beautiful; we are
happy; do not let us go up to Hillside to-day--or any more."
I spoke not so much wildly as naturally and weariedly; but Annie's cheek
flushed scarlet, as she started, with a touch of Miss Darry's energy,
from the stump beside me.
"Yes, Sandy, we will go to Hillside at once; you shall tell Miss Darry,
that, in talking over by-gone days with your little sister, you forgot
yourself and overstayed your time; and I, too, must make my excuses."
She walked quickly away, and before I had risen, in a half-stupefied
way, she was at the stile.
It was rather difficult to rejoin her. I had the novel and not
altogether pleasing sensation of having been refused before I had asked;
and my child-friend, taught of Nature's simple dignity and sense of
right, was more at ease for the remainder of the walk than I.