ROSALIA.
“A lovely being scarcely formed or moulded,
A rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded.”
BYRON.
“Mind, Hagar, you must be attentive to your uncle, he is not well, my
love, and you must do nothing to annoy him—now, will you promise me,
Hagar?” had been the earnest injunction and question of Sophie as she
was taking leave of little Hagar the morning of her departure for
Baltimore. The child was silent and sulky. This argued ill.
“Oh, Hagar! will you let me depart in anxiety of mind when I may never
see you again?”
Hagar was still inexorable.
“Will you not be gentle and good with _Raymond’s_ father?”
“Yes!” said she, raising her flashing eyes, “for Raymond’s sake.”
Now it must not be inferred from this that there was unmitigated
antagonism between the wild child and her solemn uncle-in-law, but there
was that which was far more exasperating, a capricious and fretful
attraction. Sometimes highly amused or deeply interested in the child’s
strong, keen, and original genius, he would take her into great favor
for days together, keep her always with him in his study, open to her
hungry and greedy mind stores of food, win her affections, and then, at
some fancied irreverence or impropriety on her part, would shake her
from his hand as though she had been a viper, and drive her from the
room.[3] And she would fly from the house, stung and suffering, to take
refuge in the dark woods, among the grey rocks, or on the gravelly beach
of the surging bay. The wild child took to the wild scenes of nature, as
naturally as the squirrel takes to the trees, the bird to the air, or
the fish to the water; and soon she was at home there, soon she learned
to climb a tree with the swiftness and agility of a monkey; soon she
learned, alone, to launch the boat, and wield the oar with a skill and
grace that nothing but instinct could have taught, and in the very
spirit of adventure she would make long voyages of discovery up and down
the shores of the bay. And if a storm was brewing, if the sky was
darkened and the thunder muttering in the distance, if danger was ahead,
so much the more tempting and exciting was the voyage to the fearless
child. The same spirit of adventure and inquiry would lead down a
darksome forest-path, into the deepest dells, and most tangled thickets,
and far away into the wildest solitudes of the wilderness; and the close
hiss of a serpent, or the distant growl of a wolf, would only send color
to the lips and cheeks, and light to the eyes of the girl, whose ardent
soul panted for excitement. Do you ask where she got her fiery blood
from? I do not know exactly, perhaps the spark was transmitted from some
Egyptian long since. All I can tell is, that the same wild spirit of
adventure had incited several of her ancestors from time to time to
rebellion against church and state, had sent the founder of the American
branch into the new country, and now occasionally broke out in a
solitary member of the house, as in Hagar. And where was Sophie while
her little charge roamed over river, creek, and bay, forest, moor, and
rock, at large? Absorbed in the care of her lunatic husband, fancying
Hagar safe at play, she remained in total ignorance of the child’s
woodland sports and salt-water voyages.
Footnote 3:
Some people who are not lunatics treat their children in a less degree
in the same capricious way; alternating unreasonable fondness with
unmerited harshness; and nothing can be more fatal to the temper and
character of a child.
Sophie had fallen into that dangerous error so common to enthusiasts—the
exclusive absorption in one duty, to the neglect of others. Sophie’s
self-devotion would have been good as it seemed beautiful, had it been
governed by _moderation_. It has been ingeniously said by Hassler that
“from its position in the solar system, neither too close nor too far
removed from the centre of light and heat—_moderation_ would seem to be
the peculiar virtue appropriate to our earth”—and when one thinks of it,
it would seem the one thing needful for a better reason than mere
locality. Moderation is the moral gauge, the moral regulator, and should
be president of the debating society of the passions, propensities,
sentiments, and virtues. Moderation is to the heart what reason is to
the head. Moderation is just precisely that hair line, erroneously said
to be invisible, that divides the right from the wrong, good from evil,
and virtue from vice. For see: courage is a good thing, but carried
beyond the bounds of moderation it becomes rashness—which is a bad
thing. Cautiousness is also good, but beyond moderation it becomes
cowardice—which is bad. Liberality on the other side of the line of
moderation is prodigality. Even religion, piety, which is most
excellent, stretched beyond the line of moderation becomes fanaticism,
superstition—which is anything but worship and honor to the Creator. I
can quote Scripture for that, “Be not righteous over much.”
Poor Sophie was “over much,” and hence her self-sacrifice was not, as it
might have been, productive of unmingled good. To Hagar it brought much
evil, not only by leaving her to the pursuit of her own wild pleasures,
but in subjecting her before she could understand it to the caprices of
an unimpaired intellect excited by a nervous and bilious temperament.
Her sentiments towards her uncle were at the time of Sophie’s departure
a singular and most exasperating blending of affection and anger, if not
of positive love and hatred. He would take her into favor for weeks, and
just as she was growing confident and easy in his affection, he would
throw her off without a cause, and treat her with freezing coldness for
other weeks; her first feeling would be a mixed emotion of sorrow and
anger, and that would subside into a cold dislike, fostered by his
unkind manner; and then just as she was getting to hate him comfortably,
feeling quite justified in entertaining the sentiment and quite
independent in consequence, lo and behold, some unexpected, and as it
would seem to her, some undeserved act of kindness or tenderness would
melt the iceberg in her bosom, and she could weep in very penitence for
all the coldness she had felt and shown.
When Sophie left the Hall, Hagar, according to her promise, tamed her
heart of fire and gave every gentle attention to her provoking uncle,
who was now in one of his morose fits by reason of Sophie’s absence, and
therefore was very hard to be satisfied. A week passed away, during
which Hagar’s short stock of patience was nearly exhausted by receiving
in return for all her attention cold looks, short replies, and
half-suppressed grumblings—the dark sky and muttering thunder of an
approaching storm.
Affairs were in this state at the Hall when the day of Sophie’s expected
return arrived. The packet usually put out a little boat and landed
passengers for the Hall upon the beach under the promontory. Early in
the afternoon, Hagar’s falcon eye descrying a sail upon the bay, she ran
down to the promontory, sped down the rocky declivity with the agility
and swiftness of a kid, and stood upon the sunny beach to await its
approach. The packet swiftly approached, stopped opposite the
promontory, and a boat put out from her side, and was swiftly rowed to
the beach.
Hagar sprang to meet her aunt, who stepped upon the sand, leading a
little girl of about three years of age, dressed in deep mourning. Hagar
had sprang up into Sophie’s arms and given her a quick embrace, when the
latter putting her down, said—“Kiss your cousin, Hagar.”
“Yes, kiss me, Hagar,” said the little one, “kiss me, love me—I’ve got
no mother.” And the large bright tears rolled down her rosy cheeks.
Hagar caressed her as a kitten might caress a young dove, with its claws
out. And the soft sensitive pet half evaded her wire-like clasp. “Oh!
she is a city baby, used to be nursed by _white_ nurses, and to step her
little soft feet upon pavements, and to play with dolls in
dressing-rooms; she shrinks from me, whose play-grounds are the forest,
rocks, and waters—and whose toys are bows, arrows, and guns.” And Hagar
bent forward and gazed with her keen eyes into the face of the timid
child as they walked side by side towards the ascent of the cliff. Here
even Sophie’s hand afforded little assistance to the unpractised feet of
the infant as she toiled up the steep and dangerous cliff, glancing with
terror at the sharp projecting points of the rocks sticking up ready to
impale her soft form if she missed her footing. Hagar gazed at the
little frightened toiler, half in pity, half in amusement, until
suddenly the devil leaped into the eyes of the wild child, and seizing
her cousin, she swung her upon her shoulder, and springing from the spot
with the bound of a kid, scarcely touching the points of the rocks with
her light feet, she flew up the steep knobs of the cliff—while Rose
clung to her neck in deadly terror, and Sophie raised her hands in
awe-struck astonishment. Arrived at the top safe, she set her down,
panting, and tenderly as she knew how soothed her alarm. But from that
moment through all her after life, Rosalia feared and shrank from Hagar.
Mr. Withers received Sophie with visible pleasure and affection; drawing
her to his bosom and pressing a kiss upon her lips. But when he stooped
to welcome her little charge Rosalia, he suddenly drew back, shaded his
eyes with his hands, and gazed at her; then recovering himself, he
welcomed the orphan with a few words of encouragement and re-assurance.
After the children were in bed that night, and while Withers and Sophie
sat by the parlor fire, he said, as if half musing, “The same intense
blue eyes, the same golden hair, except that both are softer.” Then
suddenly turning to Sophie, and speaking earnestly, he said—“Tell me, my
guardian angel, is it an illusion of my wayward imagination, or does
Rosalia resemble—resemble—?”
“Raymond?” suggested Sophie, with tact.
“Yes, Raymond,” he replied quickly. “You have seen it then, too?”
“Yes, she _does_ resemble Raymond—but that may be from her having the
same colored hair and eyes, and the same delicately fair skin—which she
takes from her mother, my sister Rosalia, who was of that complexion.”
“Yes—but the features, the expression, that peculiar arch of the
delicate upper lip, that sweeping curve of the upper lids falling over
‘eyes whose light might fix the glance of any seraph gazing not on God,’
and the elegantly carved hand and arm, and foot—the very form and
features of—of—” he paused and sighed deeply—“of Fanny Raymond. Yes, of
Fanny Raymond, as I knew her when a child—except that this child has
more softness, tenderness—more lymph, if one might use the expression.”
“Why do you not tell me all about it, Mr. Withers; then you would feel
better, then there would be freer conversation between us; no starts,
broken sentences and misapprehensions.”
“Why do you wish to pry into my secrets?” asked he angrily, and rising,
paced the floor with moody air and a dark brow. After a while he
returned and sat down. Sophie went and sat beside him—and obtaining
possession of his hand caressed it as she said gently,
“I do not wish to pry into your secrets, believe me I do not—I only wish
to give you peace; after so long a time, do you not know me for your
friend?”
“Well, then, Sophie, do not exasperate me by questions of my past life;
at some periods I have very little self-control, as you very well know.”
His moroseness increased from this hour, until a day or two after his
disease broke out in phrensy. His attack had reached its crisis, passed
it, and declined into gloom as before. Sophie had successfully guarded
him from public exposure. Again as before, a sermon written during the
exalted stage of his insanity, had electrified the whole country. It
seemed strange, but it was not unprecedented in the annals of insanity,
that one who had well nigh lost his reason, should at some periods
perceive the points of his subject with microscopic distinctness, and
argue them with mathematical closeness and precision. It was less
strange, that into this perfect body of logic, his burning imagination
should cast a soul of eloquence, fire, and life. His fame was spread all
through the neighboring counties, and crowds flocked to hear him preach.
Could they at some seasons have seen his heart, or even entered his
home! And yet they knew as much, and judged as correctly of him, as many
of us know and judge of some around and near us every day. Still he
accomplished much good. Sophie felt this, and took heart amid her
troubles. Truth, pure _truth_, loses none of its force and point by any
mode of conveyance through which it reaches its object. Truth diluted
with falsehood, comes weak and faint through any medium.
It would be vain to try to give you any fair idea of the winning beauty
and gentle grace of the little Rosalia Aguilar, whom but to look upon
was to love. She soon became the favorite of the whole house, from its
solemn master down to old Cumbo in the kitchen. Hagar loved her at
first, and tried to teach her to make and use little bows and arrows,
and to coax her off to her forest haunts, or out on the bay; but when,
after her repeated efforts, she found the gentle and timorous child
still shrank from her offers of entertainment, she left her alone—and
afterwards, when she felt that the loving little beauty was winning from
her the little hold she had upon the affections of the household, her
heart became bitter, and the jealous trait in her character grew and
strengthened. More than ever she took to the desolate scenes about her
native hall. She made wider excursions upon the bay, and deeper inroads
into the forest—in the wild wantonness of her nature she would scale the
most difficult rocks, and skim along the very edge of the most fearful
precipices, or climb the tallest trees, and letting herself out upon the
frailest branches, rock up and down between earth and sky, delighted to
tamper with danger; or if the branch beneath her broke, save herself,
monkey-like, by an agile spring and catch at the nearest bough. Thus the
keen perceptive faculties of the child were only employed in perfecting
her animal strength and agility. And Sophie? had Sophie quite abandoned
her? No; but occupied with her unhappy and exacting husband, and with
her younger and more helpless niece, Sophie seeing Hagar always well,
left her very much to herself. And indeed the wild child was always
rather beyond the control of her gentle relatives. Thus passed the
winter.
The close intimacy that had subsisted between the little families of
Heath Hall and Grove Cottage, had been considerably interrupted since
the marriage of Sophie. She wished to preserve the secret of her
husband, and therefore rather discouraged the continuance of the
hitherto almost daily intercourse between the families. Emily also felt
an aversion to the minister that had an influence in severing the close
intimacy of the friends. And Augustus, too, being in daily attendance
upon a school three miles in the opposite direction, found little chance
to visit his old playmate Hagar. Emily, however, though her visits were
few and far between, still felt in all its devotion her warm affection
for Sophie. Other neighbors, mere acquaintances, came occasionally to
the Hall, and sometimes spent a day there, or a day and night after the
manner of country neighborhood visiting, but from these careless and
uninterested observers Sophie succeeded in keeping her misfortune
secret. The two children were objects of considerable attention from
these visitors, and the striking contrast of their persons, manners, and
characters, noted and commented upon, _in their presence_. The winning
beauty and sweet confiding sociability of the fair cherub, and the wild
shy reserve of the dark child, were compared, and sagely commented
upon—and conclusions very disparaging to Hagar, drawn by these
superficial critics who did not understand her. Indeed the contrast
between these two children was so striking, that they were never passed
by strangers or servants without some such remark as this—“Rosalia is
beautiful, lovely—but that other child is _very_ homely.” It is very
wrong to make remarks on the personal beauty or ugliness of children in
their hearing. The effect is invariably injurious. It is highly
reprehensible to draw _invidious comparisons_ between the beauty of
children, especially before their faces. This thoughtlessness is fraught
with the direst consequences. When you say so carelessly in their
presence, that “Anne is prettier than Jane,” and look at Anne as though
her accidental beauty were a virtue, and look at Jane as though she were
in fault—think that into the fertile soil of the children’s hearts you
have dropped the seeds of evil—the seed of vanity in the heart of Anne,
the seed of envy into that of Jane, and the germ of discord into both.
Upon Rosalia and Hagar these thoughtless remarks were producing the
worst effects. Rosalia, loved, petted and praised, by the family, the
servants and visitors, with all her gentleness and sweetness, was
growing vain, selfish, and sensual—and loved best of all things to lie
in some old lady’s soft lap and suck sugarplums, while the said old lady
caressed and praised her. And she was a most endearing child; unlike
other spoiled and petted children, she never gave way to temper—she was
much too gentle for that. She was penetrable, sensitive, not high
spirited. Sometimes in his wilful moods Mr. Withers would repulse her,
though never with the asperity with which he drove Hagar from his
presence; and she would weep, and come back, and coax and caress him
until the madman, subdued by the power of love, would take her to his
bosom—where nestling herself cosily, she would fall into the deep
sleep—the reaction of her excitement; while his own stormy soul,
mesmerized, would subside into calmness. And daily his love for her and
his aversion to Hagar increased. Upon Hagar, too, these influences were
producing the worst effects. Jealousy and suspicion of the few she
loved, scorn and contempt for the opinions of others—neglect of her
person as little worth attention, and a morbid desire to be loved
exclusively—these were some of the evil fruits of her mal-education.