In virgin fearlessness, with step that seemed
Caught from the pressure of elastic turf
Upon the mountains, gemmed with morning dew,
In the prime morn of sweetest scents and airs;
Serious and thoughtful was her mind, and yet,
By reconcilement, exquisite and rare,
The form, port, motions, of this cottage girl,
Were such as might have quickened or inspired
A Titian's hand, addressed to picture forth
Oread or Dryad, glancing through the shade,
What time the hunter's earliest horn is heard
Startling the golden hills.
"EXCURSION" - WORDSWORTH.
On one of those mild days, which occur now and then during the
winter, and which bear with them a peculiar charm, Mrs.
Middleton and I had strolled out together, after breakfast,
into her own flower-garden. She was making a winder nosegay of
the few hardy flowers that had outlived the frost, and that
seemed reviving in the strange softness of this January day.
"What a morning for a ride! my own Ellen," said my aunt, as we
leant on the stone wall, which felt quite warm with the rays
of the wintry sun. "What do you say to ordering the horses,
taking a long gallop, and coming home with me with a bloom on
your dear cheeks, which look too often like that flower, and
too seldom like this one;" and she showed me, with a smile, a
white camellia, and a China rose, which she had just gathered
in the green-house.
"I will do as you wish, dear aunt--please myself, and have the
merit of obedience into the bargain; and I shall take these
flowers too, to put in my hair this evening. But where shall I
ride?"
"If you have no choice, my darling, I will give you an errand.
You know Bridman Manor?"
"O yes! the ruins of the old hall, which my maid used to call
the 'ghost-house,'--the old-fashioned gardens, with their
broken statues and evergreen alleys, that always put me in
mind of your favourite lines, by Mary Howitt--
'O, those old abbey gardens, with their devices rich;
Their fountains and green solemn walks, and saints in many
a niche.'
I shall like of all things to go there to-day; but what is
your errand?"
"Why, I do not know if I ever told you that your uncle had
been so kind as to give up to me that pretty cottage of his,
that stands on the east side of Bridman-terrace wall, for old
Mrs. Tracy, who was my nurse, and afterwards Henry's. You have
seen her, have you not, Ellen?"
"No," I answered; "but I have often heard you mention her."
"She was a person of some importance in our family at one
time. You know that my mother died in childbirth, and that
Henry's life as an infant was only saved by this woman's
unwearied devotion. She was passionately attached to Henry,
and her singular disposition and turn of mind gave her a hold
upon him which he did not entirely shake off even when he was
taken from under her care. I believe her temper was violent;
but as a child he never suffered from it, and quite idolised
her. She had a great deal of natural cleverness, and her
manners and language were always different from those of
persons in her rank of life. I shall be curious to hear what
you think of her."
"What made you think of establishing her at Bridman?"
"Her son and his wife, who had gone out to India three years
ago, and left their children in her care, had both died of a
fever at Madras. She felt anxious to remove from the
neighbourhood of London, and to settle in this part of the
country. She came to me last summer, and asked my advice on
the subject. I felt much interested about her, for it was an
only son she had lost, and his children are, with the
exception of Henry, the only objects of interest she has in
the world. Her voice trembled with emotion whenever she
mentioned them; and though she is tolerably well off as to
money, I believe, I felt glad to afford her, in her
affliction, a quiet and pleasant home. Your uncle agreed to
her living in Bridman Cottage, and I hear she settled there a
short time ago. I should like to send her a kind message, and
to hear how she is going on."
"I shall be delighted to be your messenger, and will instantly
prepare for the ride. As you are going back to the
breakfast-room, pray tell Henry to be in readiness."
At twelve o'clock the horses came round; we mounted, and set
off at a brisk gallop across the Park. As I turned into the
lane that led in the direction of Bridman Manor, Henry asked
me where I meant to go.
"To pay a visit."
"To whom?"
"To an acquaintance of yours."
"Who can you mean?"
"A very old acquaintance of yours."
"My dear Ellen, you are taking quite a wrong road: this lane
leads to no house and to no cottage that we are acquainted
with."
"I beg your pardon; it leads to Bridman Manor, and I am going
there."
"Who do you know there?"
"Nobody; but I am going to make acquaintance with your old
nurse, Mrs. Tracy."
He muttered something which sounded to me like an oath, and as
I turned and looked at him, I was astonished at the singular
expression of his countenance. He smiled, however, and said:
"You will be making acquaintance in that case with one of the
most insupportable women that ever lived. I strongly recommend
you to keep out of her way. She wears my life out with her
querulous temper and tiresome complaints; and as I do not want
to go through a scene with her, you would greatly oblige me,
Ellen, by giving up this project."
"I am going there with a message from Mrs. Middleton: but you
need not appear. Hide yourself in the manor woods, if you dare
not face your nurse, and I will join you there on my way
home."
Henry looked both vexed and provoked, but made no answer. He
soon rallied, however, and began again talking and laughing in
his usual manner. As we were slowly mounting a hill, his horse
suddenly stumbled; he jumped off, and, calling to me to stop,
he examined his foot; and finding, or pretending to find, a
stone in it, he set about vainly endeavouring to knock it out.
"I cannot go on any further, Ellen: all I shall be able to
manage will be to get home without laming this horse; so pray
turn back now;--you can take this message some other day."
"Sit down on that bank, 'that mossy bank where the violets
grow,' my dear Henry, and muse there in sober sadness, while I
face the dragon in her den." And saying these words, I
galloped off without further discussion. I had not gone far
before he overtook me; and quoting the words of Andrew
Fairservice in "Rob Roy," which we had been reading lately, he
cried out:
"Well, a wilful man maun have his way: he who will to Curragh,
must to Curragh!" and we proceeded on our road.
On passing the gates of Bridman Manor, we skirted the edge of
the woods till we came to a terrace, where the ground was laid
out in quaint patterns; and vases, some broken, some in
tolerable preservation, were still ranged with some sort of
symmetry. By the side of what had once been a fountain sat a
group which attracted my attention by the picturesque effect
which it afforded. On the back of one of those nondescript
semihuman monsters, whose yawning mouths once formed the
spouts of the fountain, sat a girl whose features struck me as
perfectly faultless, and delicate almost beyond what one could
have fancied possible in a living creature of real flesh and
blood. She resembled the _ideal_ of a sculptor; her little
hand was laid on the moss-stained marble, and though not very
white, its shape was so perfect that it was pleasant to gaze
upon it--as it is upon any rare work of art. Near her was a
little boy, apparently about three years old, who was standing
on tiptoe, and thrusting his curly head into the cavity of the
sphinx's mouth; another boy, who might have been ten or twelve
years of age, had climbed up to the vaulted top of the
fountain, and was looking down from that position at a little
trickling thread of water, which still found its way into the
basin below, though its passage was nearly choked by the moss
and the creeping plants that intercepted its course.
As we were passing them the girl looked up, and, suddenly
rising, curtseyed; and, taking hold of the little boy's hand,
said, "Mr. Henry."
Henry stopped his horse, and, bowing to her in a manner that
rather surprised me, in a voice that sounded to me unlike his
usual one, he asked her if her grandmother was at home.
"Yes, Sir, she is," was her answer.
He turned to me and said, "That is Alice Tracy, Ellen; you can
make acquaintance with her, while I speak to that boy there,
who seems in a fair way to break his neck."
Dismounting hastily, he threw his horse's reins over one of
the spikes of the adjoining railing, and sprang up to the spot
where the boy was perched.
"Is that pretty child your brother?" I inquired of the
beautiful girl who stood before me.
"He is," she answered; and lifting up the blushing boy, who
was hiding himself behind her, she turned his reluctant
glowing little face full towards me, in spite of his
struggling efforts to thrust it into her lap, and then bent
down to kiss his forehead, saying at the same time, "Naughty
Johnny!"
"Will you come to me, Johnny?" was my next attempt at
acquaintance.
"No, I won't," was the answer.
"What, not to ride this pretty black horse?"
"Yes, I will," was as resolutely pronounced; and soon the
little fellow was hoisted up to my knees, and began amusing
himself by vigorously pulling at my Selim's black mane.
"I am come with a message to your grandmother from Mrs.
Middleton; she is anxious to know how you like Bridman."
"I dare say grandmother likes it very much; and Mrs. Middleton
is very kind."
"Do you like it?"
"O yes."
"Better than the last place you lived at?"
"That was very nice, but this is better."
"What do you like better in it?"
"Many things."
At this moment I saw the boy who had been speaking with Henry
dart off suddenly, and scamper away in the direction of the
village. Henry at the same time joined us.
"Ah," he exclaimed, "you have contrived to tame that
unmanageable little savage, who always screams when he sets
eyes on me. Well, suppose you give him a ride up to the
entrance of the village, and then Alice can walk home with us,
and introduce you to her grandmother."
Alice made some objections to Johnny's lengthened ride, which
he (Johnny) resented by pushing her most stoutly away, when
she attempted to remove him from his post; and victoriously
shouting over her discomfiture, he shook the bridle with
exultation, and we proceeded towards the village. As we
arrived in sight of Bridman Cottage, the boy who had preceded
us came running back to meet us; and I heard him say in a low
voice, as he came up to Henry, "Granny's in, and I 've done
your bidding."
Henry then advised me to get off my horse; and lifting down
the child first, he helped me to dismount, and we walked to
the cottage. It was one of those lovely little homes that we
rarely see but in England, and that look (would that they
always were!) like the chosen abodes of peace and happiness.
The low thatched roof--the bright square-paned little
windows--the porch overgrown with clematis, jessamine, and
honeysuckle--the garden, where gooseberry bushes and stately
hollyhocks grow side by side. Of this description was Bridman
Cottage, and one of the loveliest that I ever set eyes upon.
As we entered, an elderly female came to the door, and, making
me a curtsey, said, in a formal manner, "This is an honour I
had not looked to, but I know how to be thankful for it, Miss
Middleton. Mr. Henry, I hope I see you well?"
"As well as usual, thank you (he replied). Miss Middleton has
brought you a message from her aunt."
"Yes," I immediately said; "Mrs. Middleton is very anxious to
know that you find yourself happy and comfortable here, and
would have come herself to see you, if she had been able to
leave my uncle for so long; but he has been ill lately, and
she scarcely ever goes far from the house."
"Tell Mrs. Middleton, Ma'am, that the house is good; that the
children are well; and that I am grateful to her."
There was something chilling in the manner with which this was
said, and the glassy eyes and thin lips of Mrs. Tracy were far
from prepossessing.
I made, however, another effort, and said, "If you could
manage to get as far as Elmsley, my aunt would, I know, be
glad to see you."
"I have nursed her at my bosom, and carried her in my arms,
and I do not care less for her now than I did then; but if it
was to save her life, I would not go to Elmsley and see--"
"Me there," exclaimed Henry. "I told you, Ellen, that I should
have to go through a scene, and now, I suppose, it must come
to pass. Go upstairs with Alice while I make my peace;" and as
he spoke, he almost pushed me out of the room, and shut the
door.
Alice followed me, and said, in her gentle voice, as I stood
at the bottom of the narrow stairs, somewhat puzzled and at a
loss what to do,
"If you will come to my room, Miss Middleton, I can show you
some of the reasons that make me like Bridman so much."
I gladly assented. She led the way, and opened the door of a
small room, in which there was no furniture, but a little bed,
with dimity curtains of snowy whiteness, a deal table, and two
straw chairs.
"This is a nice room," she said; "but come to the window, and
you will see one of my reasons."
She threw up the sash, and pointed with her little hand to the
village church, which rose in quiet beauty from among the
leafless trees.
"Is it not pretty?" she asked, with a smile.
"Very pretty," I answered; and as I used her own simple words,
I felt that there was that in them, said as she said them,
that is often wanting in pages of impassioned eloquence, in
volumes of elaborate composition,--_reality_. She was happy in
this place, because of her little room, and because of the
view of the village church, which she could see from its
window. How pure must be the mind, how calm must be the life,
when such a circumstance can give a colouring to it.
"Alice, have you no books? I see none here."
"I have a few; do you wish to see them?"
"Yes, I do; I should like to know what books you like."
"Then I must show you another of my _reasons_," she said, with
one of her sweet, calm smiles, and opened the door of another
very small room, which had no other entrance than through her
own.
There was a little table in it, and a wooden stool; both were
placed near the window. Upon the table lay two books--one was
a Bible, the other a large prayer-book, bound in red morocco,
and illustrated with prints. A shelf hung in one comer;
"Jeremy Taylor's Holy Living and Dying," the "Pilgrim's
Progress," "Bishop Heber's Hymns," and a few more books
besides, were ranged upon it. Among them, a small one, which I
was well acquainted with, called "Birds and Flowers,"
attracted my attention. I asked Alice if she had read it
through.
"Yes, I have," she replied. "Mr. Henry gave it me a few months
ago."
I involuntarily started, and looked up into her face, as she
said this; but not a shade of embarrassment was to be seen
there.
She went on to say--"He gave it to me because I was so fond of
this poor flower;" and she pointed to a sickly creeping plant,
that grew out of a pot, which was placed on the window sill.
"You would not know it again now," she continued; "but last
summer it was growing against the wall in the little patch of
garden we had at Bromley, and a beautiful flower it was."
"But what had it to do with this book, more than any other
flower, Alice?"
"It is a little story, but I will tell it you if you wish it.
I sprained my ankle last summer, and could not walk for many
weeks. Granny or brother Walter used to drive me in my chair
to the open window, to breathe the fresh air, and look at the
flowers in our little garden. There was nothing else to look
at there--nothing but roofs of houses and black chimneys; but
up the wall, and as high as my window, grew this very plant,
that looks so dead now, poor thing. Day after day I watched
its flowers, though I did not know their names, till I got to
see in them things that I thought nobody but me had ever
noticed."
"What things, Alice?"
"Across, a crown of thorns, nails, and a hammer."
"The Passion Flower!"
"So Mr. Henry told me one day when he found me reading my new
kind of book. It was like a book to me, that pretty flower; it
made me think of holy things as much as a sermon ever did."
"And Henry brought you then this book, because of the poem in
it on the Passion Flower?"
"He did, and read it to me out loud. It felt strange but
pleasant to have one's own thoughts spoken out in such words
as those."
"And you brought away your Passion Flower with you?"
"Yes, but it is dying now; and this gives me thoughts too,
which I wish somebody would write about. I should like to hear
them read out."
I took up her book, and drawing a pencil from my pocket, I
rapidly wrote down the following lines:--
"O wish her not to live again,
Thy dying passion flower,
For better is the calm of death
Than life's uneasy hour.
Weep not if through her withered stern
Is creeping dull decay;
Weep not, If ere the sun has set,
Thy nursling dies away.
The blast was keen, the winter snow
Was cold upon her breast;
And though the sun is shining now,
Still let thy flower rest.
Her tale is told; her slender strength
Has left her drooping form.
She cannot raise her bruised head
To face another storm.
Then gently lay her down to die,
Thy broken passion flower;
And let her close her troubled life
With one untroubled hour."
Alice read these lines as I wrote them. When I had finished,
she shook her head gently, and said,--
"These are pretty words, and pretty thoughts too; but not my
thoughts."
"Tell me your own thoughts, Alice; I would fain hear them."
"I can't," she said.
"Try."
"I think as I see the flowers die so quietly, that they should
teach us to die so too. I think, when I see my poor plant give
up her sweet life without complaining, that it is because she
has done what she ought to do, and left nothing undone which
she ought to have done. I planted her in my little garden, and
she grew up to my window; she gave me buds first, and then
flowers--bright smiling flowers; and when I was ill she gave
me holy happy thoughts about God and Christ. And therefore I
wish to do likewise--to do my duty in that state of life to
which it shall please God to call me; and then to die quietly,
when it shall please Him, like my passion flower."
As she was finishing these words, I was startled by the loud
and angry tones of Henry and of Mrs. Tracy, who seemed to be
disputing violently. They were speaking both at the same time,
and his voice was quite hoarse with anger. I overheard these
words:--"I tell you that if you do not command yourself, and
behave as I desire you, I will never see you again, or put my
foot into your house."
A tremendous oath followed this threat, and then their voices
subsided. I looked at Alice; she seemed concerned, but not
surprised or agitated, at what was going on down-stairs, and
merely closed the door of her room, which had been left open.
A that moment, however, Henry came half-way up the stairs, and
calling to me said that it was late, and that we had better be
setting out again. I complied, and in coming down into the
room below I was civilly greeted by Mrs. Tracy, who thanked me
for my visit, and muttered something about hoping we should
soon meet again. Had it not been for Alice, who had interested
and charmed me to an extraordinary degree, I should have
formed exactly a contrary wish, for I had never more heartily
agreed with any opinion than with that which Henry had
pronounced about his former nurse; and her civility was to my
mind more repulsive still than her ungraciousness. I took
leave of her coldly enough, but earnestly pressing Alice's
hand as I mounted my horse, I whispered in her ear, "Alice, I
like your poem better than mine," and rode off.
We took a different road from that we had come by, and skirted
the edge of a small lake that lies on the eastern side of the
Bridman Woods. The day was altered, and dark clouds were
beginning to gather over the sky; the wind was whistling among
the bare branches, and Henry was unusually silent and
pre-occupied. I felt depressed too, and we did not speak for
some time. I was revolving in my mind what possible cause
there could be for a man of Henry's character and habits
entering into such a violent altercation with a person of Mrs.
Tracy's age and inferior rank in life. His temper was generally
good, and his manners peculiarly gentlemanlike; his conduct,
therefore, (however provoking she might have been,) appeared
to me unaccountable. I could not help wondering also, that he
should have associated on evidently intimate terms with that
lovely Alice, and yet had never mentioned her to any of us,
even in casual conversation. There had not been a word,
however, or a look, of his or of hers, that could, for an
instant, have allowed one to suppose that there had been
anything in their intercourse which either could have wished
to hide. As to her, I could as soon have suspected of impurity
the pearly drops that hung lightly on each twig of the
hawthorn bushes that we passed, as her young life of one evil
action, or her young mind of one evil thought. The deep blue
waters of the little lake that lay stretched at our feet, were
not more calm and more pure than her eyes; and in the marble
paleness of her fair brow--in the divine purity of her
child-like mouth--in the quiet innocence of her whole
demeanour, there was that which seemed to speak of
"Maiden meditation, fancy free."
We were going at a brisk pace alongside the water, and the
rapidity of our motion was an excuse for silence; but as we
turned away from the lake, and began ascending a steep
acclivity, which led to the moors we had yet to cross on our
way home, we were forced to slacken our pace; and as we did
so, I asked Henry in a half-joking manner, "Have you recovered
the passion you were in just now? Your forebodings seem to
have been fully realised."
"Thanks to you," he answered in a short dry manner.
"Come, come," I said, "do not visit upon me Mrs. Tracy's
disagreeableness. Indeed I think you are not as patient with
her as you ought to be, considering she is an old woman, and
was your nurse. You were speaking to her with inconceivable
violence."
"You overheard what I said to her?"
"Only a few words, and a dreadful oath."
"I was not aware that you were listening at the door. Had I
imagined that you had stationed yourself there, I should
certainly have been more guarded in my expressions."
I felt the colour rising into my cheeks, for the tone of his
voice had something in it still more insulting than his words;
but I answered carelessly, "It is a pity you did not think it
worth while to controul your temper, whether you were
overheard or not."
He coloured in his turn, and bit his lips; but suddenly
changing the subject, he abruptly said, "How do you like
Alice?"
"As I like all the beautiful things which God has made, and
that man has not spoilt."
"She is very pretty; and she has a kind of cleverness too; but
there is something tame and insipid about her,
notwithstanding. In fact, I do not understand her."
"How should the serpent understand the dove?" I muttered to
myself, and then my heart smote me for my unkind thoughts of
Henry. I felt myself guilty of ingratitude, nay more, of
hypocrisy, in thinking evil of one whose society I so much
valued, and who certainly devoted himself to me with no common
assiduity. I never could exactly explain to myself what my
feelings were with regard to him at that time. As I said
before, it would have been a severe trial to me had he left
Elmsley, even for a short time.
Hour after hour I spent in conversation with him, hardly aware
of the lapse of time, so great was the fascination that his
powerful, original, and, withal, cultivated understanding,
exercised over me; and yet, at the same time, an involuntary
feeling of mistrust--an unaccountable shudder of
repugnance--now and then shot over me as I listened to the
sound of his voice, or as my eyes met his--and yet they were
beautiful; his eyes, with their deep-gray colour that looked
black by candle-light, and the fringing of their dark lashes.
There was something reined in the shape of his small aquiline
nose--in the form of his wide but well-formed mouth, both of
which, when he was eager, bore an expression which I can only
compare to that of a fiery horse when he tosses his mane, and
snuffs the air of the plain which he is about to scour. Then
why was it, that as I looked on his beauty, day by day, I
found pleasure, if not happiness, in his devotion to me--why
was it, that, now and then, the words _fearful_, _false,_ and
_heartless_, darted across my mind as I thought of him? and
were instantaneously followed by a thrill of self-reproach,
for I was _false_ to him, not he to me; false in the contrast
between my outward demeanour and my secret and involuntary
impulses. It was I that was heartless, in feeling no real
attachment for one whose life evinced an unvarying devotedness
to me. False! Heartless! Was I really so? Resentment had
hardened my heart against Edward Middleton, and every kind
feeling I had ever entertained towards him was turned to
bitterness. Painful associations, and fearful remembrances,
had thrown a dark shade over the pure and holy love of my
childhood--the enthusiastic affection I had felt for my
aunt;--and as to Henry Lovell, whose society I eagerly sought,
and whose attachment I appeared to return, I was forced at
times to confess to myself that there was not a grain of
tenderness in the feverish predilection I entertained for him.
I felt to hate myself for the deadness and coldness of my
heart. I despised myself for the inconsistent impulses of my
soul. Abased in my own eyes, condemned by my own judgment, I
often applied to myself the words of Holy Scripture; and in
bitterness of spirit exclaimed--"Unstable as water, I cannot
excel. Wasted with misery; drunk, but not with wine, my heart
is smitten and withered like gnus. I was exalted into Heaven:
I am brought down to Hell." These thoughts occupied me during
the remainder of our ride.
When Henry uttered the remark which led to this train of
reflections in my mind, we had reached the summit of the hill,
and coming upon the wild heath that lay between us and
Elmsley, we put our horses into a rapid canter, and arrived
before the hall-door just as it was getting dusk.