DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.
One Saturday evening in June, the Seaton mail-coach, with two
passengers, drove out of the city of Bragon on its way eastward.
Both these passengers were gentlemen, and both young. One was large
and light-complexioned; the other, slight and dark. The large one
had a hard, white face, whose only expression seemed to be a fixed
determination to express nothing. Such a look is provoking. Let us
read a little of the man in spite of himself. People have no right to
shut themselves up in that way. One would say immediately that he is
what is called a very good man, one of those good men whom we praise,
and avoid: that is, he does not offend against the decalogue nor the
revised statutes. But there is a law radiant with a tenderer glory,
dropped, verse by verse, through the Scriptures, taught constantly by
the church, attested to human hearts by the very need of it, and that
law he keeps not. One wonders at such a man, and, in softer moods,
fancies pitifully that he aches under that icy coating, and that down
in the depths of his heart some little unfrozen spring perpetually
troubles his repose by its protesting, half-stifled murmur. One is
also exasperated by him. "In his society," as Miss Clara Yorke said
afterward, "one's thoughts and feelings become all puckered up." He
is indeed a powerful moral astringent.
As if conscious of our observation, he turns stiffly away, and
looks out of the window at his elbow, entertaining his mind with a
view of the spiders that hang from the beams of the covered bridge
through which they are driving. We are not to be baffled, however,
but can pursue our scrutiny. He has large, heavy white hands, his
broadcloth is of the finest, and in the breast-pocket of his coat is
a manuscript sermon. He would like to have us listen to that sermon,
but will not.
The gentleman who sits at this person's left is as different as could
well be. He has a thin face, a long nose inclining slightly upward
toward the end, and haggard, bright eyes. His forehead is high, and
all the hair is brushed straight back from it, and falls on his neck.
He has a small mouth, with lips so vividly red that they seem to be
painted. In his breast-pocket is a bottle of laudanum, which seems to
be very much at home there.
These gentlemen had never met before they stepped into the coach
together; and it would be safe to say that they had no ardent
desire to meet again. They were very slow, indeed, to improve the
opportunity afforded them to form an acquaintance, and probably would
have maintained a very formal demeanor toward each other, had not
circumstances forced them into a most undignified intimacy. There had
been a succession of pouring rains, and the roads were frightful,
heavy with mud, and full of pitfalls. After the coach got out of
the town and into the woods, their situation became very trying to
the passengers. To say nothing of the pain of bumps and bruises,
their dignity and sense of propriety were constantly being outraged
by their being thrown into each other's arms, or having their
heads knocked violently together. Under such difficulties, silence
became impracticable. Apologies became necessary, and exclamations
irrepressible. He of the sermon never said anything worse than "Bless
me!" but the other had occasionally to stifle an ejaculation which
would not have been so pleasant to hear.
The coach was due at Seaton at four o'clock in the morning; but
as hours passed, and still their motion was chiefly lateral and
perpendicular, their prompt arrival receded from a probability to a
possibility, and thence became impossible. They had started at nine
o'clock; and at three of the next morning they yet lacked nearly a
mile of reaching the half-way house where they were to change horses.
At that point one of the wheels suddenly slipped into a deep rut.
The four steaming horses strained and tugged till they started the
coach, when it immediately gave a lee-lurch, and went into a hole
at the other side. At the same moment, something, whatever it is
which holds horse and carriage together, snapped, and the quadrupeds
started off on their own account, leaving the coach and the bipeds to
follow at their leisure. The driver, having the reins in his hands,
was of course pulled off the box; but the road received him softly.
The passengers need have suffered no damage, but that the tall one,
having, curiously enough, the impression that they were being run
away with instead of from, jumped out of the coach with more haste
than discretion. The spot he sank into was the rut from which the
front wheel had just been drawn, and the result was that he emerged
upon the roadside in a deplorable masquerade, being clad in a
complete domino of well-mixed clay and water. Moreover, his ankle was
quite severely sprained.
"You'll have to walk to the half-way house, gentlemen," the driver
said, calmly wiping the mud from his face. He had been over that
road too many times to be much disturbed at any mishap of the kind.
Having spoken, he shouldered the mail-bags, and started in advance.
It was full three minutes before the other passenger appeared, and,
when he did, his face was perfectly grave, though very red. He threw
a blanket he had found inside out into the road, and stepped on to
it. He next reached in and got a cushion, with which he completed
the bridge across the mud, then walked over them as unstained as
Queen Elizabeth over Raleigh's mantle, and stepped dry-shod in the
neatest of boots on to the rim of the delicate moss that spread its
carpet all along the roadside under the trees. Having landed safely,
he turned toward his companion, who was trying to wash himself in a
brook and scrape his clothes with sticks. "I should advise you, sir,"
he said, "to come right on to the house, and get a complete change of
clothing. It is useless to try to clean those."
The other was speechless, and seemed too much stupefied to do
anything more than obey.
Morning was just breaking, cloudless and beautiful, the forest was
fresh with June, and through it could be heard the elfish laughter of
brooks. While the travellers had through the night been racked and
tormented, conscious only of misery and mud, all around them nature
had reposed in her loveliness and purity, with her birds sweetly
nestled, her flowers dewwashed, her streams crystal-clear. Their
road had been like a foul thread woven across a beautiful web.
When they reached the half-way house, the tall traveller was in a
perfectly abject state. His pride had quite disappeared, his dignity
was nowhere to be seen. He allowed himself to be arrayed in a suit
of rough farming-clothes a good deal too short, in which he beheld
himself without a smile, and humbly begged his fellow-traveller to
bear a message from him to his expecting friends in Seaton. Not only
his toilet, but his sprained ankle would prevent his proceeding on
his journey for some hours at least. His name was Conway; he was a
Baptist minister, and was expected to preach in Seaton that day.
Would the gentleman be so good as to send word to the church, as
soon as he arrived, that their looked-for candidate had met with an
accident? He was not personally acquainted with any one in Seaton,
therefore could not direct him, but presumed that the driver could.
The gentleman with the bright eyes cordially promised, then asked for
breakfast and a clothes-brush, and the other withdrew to rest.
"There's not time to cook anything but coffee and fish," the landlord
said. "Passengers never stop here to breakfast; and the driver is
going on in fifteen minutes. But I'll do the best I can for you."
In ten minutes all was ready. The traveller brushed his clothes
scrupulously, combed his hair back in a silken wave, bathed his face
and hands, gave himself one more look to be sure that his toilet was
correct, then seated himself at table. The principal dish before him
was an eel fried in sections, then carefully put together, and coiled
round the plate.
"Not much of a breakfast," the landlord said. "But we haven't any
market here."
"Sir!" exclaimed the traveller in a deep voice, "I asked for fish,
and you give me a serpent! I would as soon--I would sooner eat of an
anaconda than an eel."
"I'm sorry you do not like it, sir," the man replied. "If we raised
anacondas here, you should have one; but we don't."
The traveller drank his coffee, and found it not bad. "I will try to
do without snakes, this morning," he remarked.
There were twelve miles yet to travel; but the road improved slightly
as they went on. Still it was tedious work; and when at last they
drove into the town, it was past ten o'clock, and the bells were
ringing for Sunday service.
When the coach reached the post-office, in the centre of the
town, the traveller jumped out, and asked to be directed to the
Universalist meeting-house. "And please send word to the Baptist
people of the accident which befell their minister," he said. "It
will be impossible for me to do so now."
The driver promised, and directed the stranger. "Go over the bridge
here, and up the hill, and you will come to a white meeting-house
with green blinds," he said.
The traveller hastily followed the direction, and soon came to a
house answering the description given. The congregation were all in
their seats; and as the new-comer breathlessly entered, he heard a
voice from the pulpit. "My beloved brethren," the voice said, "I am
sorry to inform you that the minister who was to have preached for us
to-day will not probably come. The stage has not come in, and has,
most likely, met with an accident. But since you have all gathered
together here to-day, it seemed to me a pity that you should go away
without hearing the word of life. I have therefore brought a volume
of sermons by the reverend--"
Here the deacon stopped at sight of the stranger hurrying up the
aisle, made an awkward gesture, took out his pocket-handkerchief,
and, finally, descended sheepishly at one side of the pulpit as our
belated traveller went up the other.
The minister seated himself on the red velvet sofa, which in the
temple occupied the place of an altar, fumbled a while in the
hymn-book for a hymn he could not find, wiped his heated face,
finally read at random. Presently there was heard from the gallery
over the entrance the faint twang of a tuning-fork, then a man's
voice feeling for the key, which he had to transpose from A to C.
Pouncing upon it at length in a stentorian _do_, he soared gradually
up through dominant to octave, the choir caught their parts, and the
hymn began. Unfortunately, however, in their haste they had selected
a common metre tune for a long metre hymn, as they discovered at the
end of the second line, where they found themselves in difficulty by
reason of two syllables which were unprovided for by the music, yet
could not well be left out.
While they were extricating themselves, and finding a more fitful
tune, the minister took breath, and looked round on his congregation.
They disappointed him. He had been informed that his hearers were
to be the young, progressive spirits of the town; and these looked
anything but young and progressive. They were nearly all old and
antiquated, and their faces struck a chill through him. They seemed
to be the faces of people who believe that one of the chief pleasures
of heaven consists in looking over the celestial battlements and
witnessing the torments of the condemned, rather than of those who
hold the comfortable doctrine of universal salvation. Stern, fateful,
stolid, they sat there, not even provoked to a passing smile by the
ludicrous _contretemps_ of the choir. The minister frowned. He was
tired, he had been irritated by his travelling companion, and now he
was bitterly disappointed. Seaton was a growing town that would soon
be a city, and he had looked forward with pleasure to the prospect of
being settled there. There seemed nowhere else for him to go, and he
was not rich, and he was homeless. The sight of this congregation,
which he saw at once he could never reconcile himself to, disturbed
him greatly. Moreover, in his haste he had forgotten to take his
morning dose of laudanum; and, altogether, but for a glimpse he got
of two faces near the pulpit, he might have marched down, and left
the deacon to read as many sermons as he chose. These two reconciling
faces belonged to Miss Melicent Yorke and her brother Owen, who were
visiting the different Seaton churches. The fair, tranquil face of
the lady, her delicate dress, her folded hands, even the wreath of
violets that rested on her flaxen hair, all made a pleasant picture
for the cultivated glance that swept over it. Of Owen he saw only the
top of the head, and the hand that covered his face. But his attitude
showed that he was hiding a laugh; and anybody who could laugh in
that congregation was balm to the minister's eyes. In those two he
felt sure of sympathy.
The hymn over, the minister read a psalm and repeated the Lord's
Prayer.
The congregation listened with lengthening faces. In fact, the
disapprobation was mutual. In the first place, they were shocked
that the candidate for their pulpit should travel on the Lord's day;
in the next place, his looks and manners were too little like those
of their former pastor, the Rev. Jabez True; thirdly, they had never
before had the Our Father foisted on them for a prayer. They were
accustomed to hear a long and explicit address to the Deity, in which
their wishes and thoughts were explained to him, and their praises
and thanks duly meted out--a prayer which they could talk about
afterward. Elder True had been gifted in prayer, and would sometimes
pray half an hour without a moment's hesitation. It was certainly a
very shabby thing to put them off with the Lord's Prayer.
Then came the sermon. Only two persons present knew that the text
was from the Koran. It was a story of a certain good man who had a
plantation of palm-trees, to which he used to call the poor, and give
them such fruit as the knife missed or the wind blew off. He died;
and his sons felt too poor to give anything away. So they agreed to
come early in the morning, and gather the fruit when the poor could
not know. But in laying their plans, they omitted to add, "If it
please God!" In the night a storm passed over the garden, and in the
morning it was as one where the fruit had all been gathered.
There are various ways in which such a text could be treated. Our
speaker, changing his plan at the last minute, irritated by the cold
and unsympathizing faces about him, and by his personal discomforts,
chose to enforce this thought: there are those who fancy that all
the fruits of grace are theirs, that they are the elect, and that
those outside of their walls shall perish with hunger while they are
feasting. Behold, the whirlwind of the wrath of God shall sweep away
the good they only seem to have, and leave them poorer than Lazarus.
It was a forced interpretation; but the speaker was dextrous, and
made himself appear consecutive even when he rambled most. With
passionate vehemence, he denounced those sanctimonious souls who
mistake a curvature of the spine for humility, and a nasal twang for
an evidence of grace. "I love not," he said, "those cold and heavy
souls that never take a generous fire. One wonders if they ever will
burn--under any future circumstances. They flatter themselves that
they are good and just and reasonable because they are emotionless.
It is not so. No heart is pure that is not passionate; no virtue safe
that is not enthusiastic. Is the diamond less fine because it is
brilliant? Has the sea no depth because it sparkles on the surface?
Would the cannon-ball go further flung by the hand than it does when
shot from the cannon's mouth? Is truth always a mountain crowned
with snow? It may be a volcano. A strong and sweet thinker has said,
'The wildest excess of passion does not injure the soul so much as
respectable selfishness does;' and he says rightly. I protest against
the apotheosis of phlegm. There are many phases of good, and each has
his way; but, for my part, I prefer the faults of heat to the faults
of cold. The former are often generous faults, the latter never so.
The faults of the former are on the surface, and can neither be
denied nor hidden; those of the latter are deep-rooted, and may be
and often are mistaken for virtues. Who were the great saints? Look
at the reckless Magdalen, the vehement St. Paul, the hasty St. Peter.
St. John of the Cross quotes as an axiom in theology the saying that
God moves all things in harmony with their constitution; and the
history of the world shows that, when he wanted to kindle a grand and
holy conflagration, he took for workers combustible men and women.
Among the apostles, the only one who was cold and calculating enough
to count money and think of the purse when the Lord was near enough
to set all their hearts on fire was Judas, and not the worst Judas in
the world either. For since his time many a pretended follower has
weighed the Holy One in a balance, and sold him for a price, and has
lacked the after-grace to hang himself."
"Let us pray!"
It was only when Miss Yorke and her brother rose, that the astonished
and scandalized congregation understood that the sermon was really
over, and they were to stand up and listen to a prayer.
The minister spoke in a voice yet vibrating with excitement: "O Lord
God of morning and evening, of storm and sunshine, of the dew that
bathes the violet and the frost that cracks the rock--God of the
east and the west, and all that lies between them--God of our souls
and our bodies, of bliss and of anguish--O God, who alone rewardest
failure, who for thy mantle, which eludes our grasp, givest us thy
hand to clasp--may all thy creatures adore thee! Our praise goes up
like the note of the small bird in the branches; but thou hast made
us weak. All power is thine! Our hearts swell and break at thy feet
as the waves break upon the shore; but thou hast set our limit. Space
is in the hollow of thy hand! We lift our eyes toward thee, and their
gaze is baffled; but thou, who seest all things, hast sealed their
vision. Glory and honor and power be unto thee, inscrutable Wisdom,
for ever and ever. Amen!"
"And he calls that a prayer!" thought the congregation.
"Why, it is like a Catholic prayer!" whispered Melicent to her
brother. "And he quotes St. John of the Cross, and the Koran, and
_Ecce Homo_. He must be an eclectic minister."
The congregation went out with very glum faces, and scattered to
their various homes. Only the deacon waited in the porch, as in duty
bound, to invite the minister home to dinner.
"I suppose you will go home with me, Brother Conway," he said,
freezingly.
"Conway!" echoed the minister. "You mistake, sir! My name is
Griffeth."
The deacon stared. "We were expecting the Reverend John Conway to
preach to-day, as a candidate for our pulpit," he said, eyeing Mr.
Griffeth suspiciously. "Do you come in his place?"
An expression of perplexity, instantly succeeded by one of poignant
amusement, passed over the minister's face. Then he became grave. "It
seems that I have come in his place," he said, "but most unwillingly.
Brother Conway met with an accident which delayed him. He sent his
regrets to you by me, and hopes he may be here this afternoon.
Good-morning, sir! I will not burden your hospitality to-day."
The deacon's face cleared. It was a blessed relief to find that they
would have no more to do with this man.
The stranger crossed the portico to where Melicent and Carl still
lingered, having overheard this conversation. "I beg your pardon!" he
said. "But will you have the kindness to tell me of what denomination
the church is in which I have been preaching?"
"It is Baptist," Carl replied; "of the kind, I think, they call
'Hard-shelled.'"
"God be praised!" ejaculated the minister. "I have got into the wrong
pulpit!"
Melicent immediately insisted on his going home with them. "We can at
least protect you from the Hard-shells until your own friends find
you," she said.
The invitation being cordially given, and seconded by Carl, the
minister thankfully accepted it, and they started on their homeward
way. "My blunder is likely to give great offence to one-half the
town, and great amusement to the other half," he said, as they went
along. "I am truly thankful to find a refuge from both."
Mrs. Yorke received her unexpected guest with the greatest kindness;
Mr. Yorke, with the greatest courtesy. It was one of the pleasantest
families in the world to visit. Not easily accessible to everybody,
nor quick to form intimacies, whomever they did receive, they made at
once at home. There was a charming ease in their company. Your sole
reminder that they understood the proprieties of life was the fact
that they never sinned against them.
Seated in the midst of the family, who gathered about him, the
minister related the adventures of the last twenty-four hours to his
smiling auditory. Only two persons present were grave. Edith could
perceive nothing ludicrous in the circumstances. It was a most sad
and uncomfortable fact that Minister Conway should have got into the
mud, she thought; and, as to preaching in the wrong pulpit, that
seemed to her a very awful mistake. The other solemn face belonged
to little Eugene Cleaveland, five years old, Major Cleaveland's
youngest son. The child was a pet of the Yorkes, and always stayed
with them when his father was away from home. He had quite adopted
them as his relatives. Mr. and Mrs. Yorke were his aunt and uncle.
The others were all cousins. Leaning on Clara's lap, quite unmindful
of her caressing hand in his hair or on his cheek, he gazed with
large, bright black eyes at the minister, drinking in every word, and
thinking his own thoughts.
"Isn't your God as good as their God is?" he asked suddenly in the
the first pause.
"We have all the same God, my child," the minister replied; and
immediately added to the others, "I perceive that we had better
change the subject, lest the little ones should be scandalized. I
fancy I even read reproof in the eyes of your niece, madam. And, by
the way, she looks like some solemn, medieval religious."
"It is odd she should suggest that thought to you," Mrs. Yorke said.
"The child is a Catholic. Come, my dear, and show Mr. Griffeth what
a pretty prayer-book you have. It was given me by a very lovely and
zealous French lady whom I knew in Paris. I thought it would do Edith
most good."
Edith approached the minister with hesitation, half-pleased with him,
half-doubtful. But while he talked pleasantly to her, glancing over
the book without a sign of prejudice, explaining and praising here
and there, her doubts were forgotten. What the child instinctively
felt was, that the man had no religious convictions; but, her reason
being undeveloped, she could not understand what he lacked. When
he learned that she was half-Polish, he delighted her by telling
how, in the glorious days of Poland, when the nobles heard Mass,
they unsheathed their swords at the Gospel, to show that they were
ready on the instant to do battle for the faith, and he promised
to procure for her a little handful of earth from the sacred soil
of Praga. He then repeated and translated for her an anonymous hymn
to the Holy Innocents, written in the fourth century, and, at Mrs.
Yorke's request, copied it into the prayer-book. It was this:
"Salvete, flores martyrum,
Quos lucis ipso in limine,
Christi insecutor sustulit,
Ceu turbo nascentes rosas.
Vos, prima Christi victima,
Grex immolatorum tener,
Aram ante ipsam, simplices,
Palma et coronis luditis."
Miss Yorke presently excused herself with the smiling announcement
that she must prepare the dessert for dinner, and Clara went out to
gather flowers for the dinner-table, taking Eugene Cleaveland with
her.
They roamed about the edge of the woods, finding wild-roses and
violets; they ventured into wet places for the blue flower-de-luce;
they gathered long plumes of ferns, and in a dusky cloister where a
brook had hidden one of its windings, they found a cardinal-flower
lighting the place like a lamp.
Suddenly the little boy cried out, and began to dance about. There
was a bug gone away up in his jacket, he declared.
Clara searched him, but found nothing.
"There's nothing on you, little dear!" she said. "Come home, now. It
is dinner-time, and you must help me to arrange the flowers. There is
no bug, child; it is all your imagination."
"Does my imagination wiggle?" he cried indignantly. "There!"
The last exclamation referred to a creeping at his throat; and out
hopped an active little frog, which had been circumnavigating the
child ever since he pulled the last blue lily.
They went homeward with their baskets of flowers, and encountered on
the way Boadicea Patten with her baby in her arms. She had come to
see her son and daughter, and was trying to keep out of sight of the
front windows, where she saw a stranger.
Clara Yorke immediately seized upon the infant. No baby ever escaped
her caresses; and this one the young ladies had taken under their
especial charge. They supplied its wardrobe, and went to see it, or
had it come to them every week. It was a pretty child, bright, white,
and well-mannered, with a lordly air of taking homage as if it were
due.
When Clara entered the parlor, she found only the gentlemen and Edith
there; but that did not prevent her insisting on her little one being
received with enthusiasm. She called attention to the wonderful
dimpled shoulders and elbows, pulled its eyelids down pitilessly to
display the long lashes, uncurled its yellow locks and let them creep
back into rings again, and crowned it with violets, quoting Browning:
"Violets instead of laurel in the hair,
As those were all the little locks could bear."
Then she consigned the child to her brother. "I have domestic cares
to attend to," she said, "and you must amuse my beauty while I am
gone. 'What must you do?' Talk to it, of course. 'What shall you
say?' Why, Owen, do not be stupid! Say whatever you can think of that
is suited to the darling's capacity. Come, Eugene, we have important
affairs on hand."
Carl looked at his charge with immense good-will and not a little
perplexity, and it stared back solemnly at him, waiting to be
entertained. Something must be said.
"What is your opinion concerning the origin of ideas?" asked the
young man, at length, with great politeness.
Instantly the little face brightened with delighted intelligence;
the lips became voluble in a strange language, and the dimpled hands
caught at Carl's sunny locks.
"Oh! for an interpreter," he exclaimed. "If we had an interpreter, we
could confound the _savants_. Clara," to his sister just returning,
"what is this little wretch saying?"
"He is saying that he loves everybody in the whole world!" she cried,
catching the babe in her arms, and half-stifling it with kisses.
"And, now, please come to dinner."
"It is not a bad solution," mused the minister, as he and Carl went
out last. "Perhaps love is the root from which our ideas grow.
Undoubtedly the kind of ideas a person has depends on the nature and
degree of his loving."
"You see that here we stand not upon the order of our going," Clara
laughed back from the doorway; "or, rather, we follow the style of
ecclesiastical processions, and place the principal person last."
There was a cluster of yellow violets by Mr. Griffeth's plate. His
eyes often turned on them, and always with a grave expression. "They
remind me of a brother I have lost," he said at length to Mrs. Yorke.
"Philip used to paint flowers beautifully, and a bunch of yellow
violets was the last thing he painted. If you were not new-comers in
Seaton, I should think it possible that you might have seen or heard
of him. He went to school here to an old minister, Mr. Blake, the
predecessor, I believe, of Dr. Martin."
"Philip Griffeth!" Mrs. Yorke exclaimed, blushing with surprise,
"Why, I went to school with him. I recollect him perfectly. This
is my native place, Mr. Griffeth. Yes, Philip was the favorite of
every one, teacher and pupils. He used to help me with my Virgil.
Mr. Blake made us all study Latin, and the boys had to study Greek.
The minister thought that no person should be admitted into polite
society who did not know one at least of these languages. I recollect
him, a small, pompous man, with an air of fierceness very foreign to
his character. He wished to be thought a stern and fateful personage,
while in truth he was the softest man alive. When he used to come to
our house, and extend his awful right hand to me, I always knew that
the left hand, hidden behind his back, held a paper of candy."
The discovery of this mutual friend formed a strong tie between the
minister and his new acquaintances, so that they seemed quite like
old friends. The family pressed him to stay till evening, when they
would send for some of his people to come for him; and he, nothing
loth, consented.
"But, I warn you," he said to the young people, when they had
returned to the parlor, "that, unless you allow me to see you often,
this hospitality will be a cruel kindness. I should find it harder to
lose than never to have had your society. I could not console myself
with less than the best, as this pretty rustic did," taking up an
illustrated copy of _Maud Müller_ that lay at his elbow. "But what a
perfect thing it is!" he added.
Mrs. Yorke was just passing through the room on her way to take an
afternoon _siesta_. She paused by the table, and glanced at the
book. "It is perfect all but the ending," she said; "that is too
pre-Raphaelite for me. Doubtless it would have happened quite so; but
I do not wish to know that it did."
"But should not art be true to nature?" asked Mr. Griffeth. He liked
to hear and see the lady talk. Her gentle ways and delicate, pathetic
grace, all charmed him.
"Art should be true to nature when nature is true to herself," she
replied. "I am not a pre-Raphaelite. I believe that the mission of
art is to restore the lost perfection of nature, not to copy and
perpetuate its defects. Otherwise it is not elevating; and what it
makes you admire chiefly is the talent which imitates, not the genius
which sees. I believe that genius is insight, talent only outsight.
My husband defines genius as artistic intuition. Why should the poet
have cheated us into loving a fair, empty shape? If the girl had
been disappointed, and had lived apart and lonely to the end of her
days, the picture would have been lovely and pathetic. But now it is
revolting."
"I agree with mamma," Miss Yorke interposed. "If Maud Müller had
married the judge, she would never have appreciated him. If she had
been capable of it, she could not have condescended to the other
after having seen him."
"I should believe," the minister said, "that, if she had possessed
true nobleness of soul, she could not have so lowered herself, even
if she had seen nothing better. To my mind, people rise to their
proper level by spontaneous combustion, needing no outward spark,
women as well as men. The philosophy of the Comte de Gabalis may be
very true as to gnomes, sylphs, and salamanders; but for women I
think that such radical changes never occur. That theory belongs to
those men who, as Mrs. Browning says, believe that 'a woman ripens,
like a peach, in the cheeks chiefly.'"
"So we have disposed of poor Maud Müller," said Mrs. Yorke. "I
repent me of having been so harsh with the sweet child. Let us say
that the poet wronged her; that in truth she faded away month by
month, and grew silent, and shadowy, and saint-like, not knowing what
was the matter with her, but feeling a great need of God's love; and
so died."
With a sigh through the smile of her ending, Mrs. Yorke passed
noiselessly from the room. The shadows of the vine-leaves seemed to
strain forward to catch at her white dress, and the sunlight dropping
through turned her hair to gold. Then shadow and sunlight fell to the
floor and kissed her footsteps, missing her.
Mr. Yorke was out walking about his farm, inquiring of Patrick how
many months it took in that country for plants to get themselves
above ground; if green peas were due early in September; if cucumbers
were not in danger of freezing before they arrived at maturity; if
their whole crop, in short, did not promise to give them their labor
for their pains; and making various other depreciatory comments which
his assistant inwardly resented. The young people sat in the parlor
and improved their acquaintance. Soon they found themselves talking
of personal matters and family plans, especially those relating to
Owen.
Mr. Griffeth strongly urged his remaining in Seaton. "I think it
would be better to remain if you should conclude to study law," he
said. "You could pursue your studies here without the distractions
of a city life, and you could begin practice with a clearer field.
You would at once be prominent here, but in the city there would be a
crowd of able and experienced practitioners in your way."
"'I would rather be second in Athens than first in Eubœa,'" Carl
objected.
"Undoubtedly!" was the immediate response. "But you might save time
by trying your wings in Eubœa before essaying your flight in Athens."
The sister eagerly seconded the proposal, delighted with any plan by
which they could keep their brother with them and yet not injure his
prospects. Carl listened with favor. His new friend had completely
captivated him; and, sure of such congenial companionship, Seaton
appeared to him a tolerable place to live in.
"Of course, I am not quite disinterested," Mr. Griffeth said. "I
want you to stay. But, also, it does seem to me well. The place is
promising. I am told that it has some superior people, and that it is
growing rapidly. My own coming was a chance, and already I rejoice in
it. One impulse pushed me toward the south, another toward the north:
obeying a philosophical law, I came east, and here I shall stay. I
recognized a Providence in it. May not you the same?"
"Oh! do stay, Owen," Hester said, laying her hand on his arm.
"What can I do when the evening star pleads with me?" said Carl with
a smile. When he was pleased with his youngest sister, he called her
Hesper.
"And you know, Carl, you promised to teach me to spell, this summer,"
said Clara. "I cannot spell!" she confessed to the minister.
"Madam, I congratulate you!" he replied.
"But it is not ignorance," she said, blushing very much. "English
spelling is nothing but memory, you know. Now, my memory is situated
in my heart, not my head, and it retains only what I love or hate.
You do not expect me to be fond of vowels and consonants, or
enamored of poly-syllables, surely."
The minister protested that he was always enchanted to meet with an
educated person who could not spell. It was, he said, the mark of a
mind which catches so ardently at the soul of a word that it misses
the form. "I have no doubt," he said, "that you might talk with a
person a hundred times, and comprehend his character perfectly, yet
not be able to tell the color of his eyes nor the shape of his nose.
You could also go unerringly to a place you had once visited, though
you could not direct a person there. You do not gather your knowledge
like corn in the ear, but in the golden grain; and when anybody wants
the cob, you have to go searching about in waste places for it."
Mr. Yorke came in, and presently Mrs. Yorke, with a little
sleep-mistiness hanging yet about her.
"Where have you been, auntie?" cried Eugene Cleveland, running to
her. He had his hands full of dandelion curls, which he began hanging
in her ears, having thus adorned the young ladies.
"I have been to the land where dreams grow on trees," she said softly.
"Mr. Griffeth says that I am a little man," the child announced, with
an air of consequence. The remark had been made an hour before, and
was not yet forgotten. The lad had indeed an exceedingly good opinion
of himself, and never forgot a word of praise.
Clara called him to her. "You are no more a man," she said, "than
potato-balls are potatoes."
He sobered instantly, and went about for some time with a very
forlorn countenance. After awhile, when she had forgotten the
remark, he came back to her. "Cousin Clara, do potato-balls ever
grow into potatoes?" he asked anxiously.
In the evening the Universalist deputation arrived, and took their
minister away with them.
"Now, Pat, you mark my words," said Betsey, as she saw the family
stand on the moonlight veranda to watch their visitor down the
avenue: "that man will marry one of the Yorke girls."
Betsey considered the speedy marriage of the young ladies a
consummation devoutly to be wished.
Patrick was still smarting under the insults offered to his garden,
and would not in any case have hailed the alliance of a minister
with the family. "Oh, bali! they wouldn't look at him!" he replied
crossly. "A rogue of a minister, with his nose in the air!"
"I have eyes in my head," said Betsey with dignity.
"And a bee in your bonnet," retorted the man.
Betsey went into the house, banged the door behind her, and began
setting the kitchen to rights with great vigor. She swept up the
hearth so fiercely that a cloud of ashes came out and settled on
the mantelpiece, and put the chairs back against the wall with an
emphasis that made them rattle.
Patrick put his head in at the door, prudently keeping his body out,
and looked at her with a deprecating smile. "Now, Betsey!" he said.
"You needn't speak to me again, to-night," she exclaimed, looking
severely away from him. "You've said enough for one time."
"And what have I said to you, Betsey?"
She faced him. "I wonder if in your country it is considered a
compliment to tell a woman that she has a bee in her bonnet," she
said.
"Ah! is that where you are?" said Pat, coming half into the room. "I
never meant the least harm in my life. And, sure, Betsey, did ye ever
see a bonnet without a _b_?"