* * * One fire burns out another's burning,
One pain is lessened by another's anguish;
Turn giddy, and be holp by backward turning;
One desperate grief cures with another's languish.
Take thou some new infection to thine eye,
And the rank poison of the old will die.--_Romeo and Juliet_.
All day the train whirled along, and Morton's troubled thoughts found
no rest.
"Matherton!" cried the conductor, opening the door of the car, as the
engine stopped in a large station house, at five o'clock in the
afternoon. Several passengers got out; two or three came in; the bell
rang, and with puffing and clanking, the train was on its way again. A
newsboy passed down the car with a bundle of newspapers and twopenny
novels. Morton bought one of the latter as an anodyne; but even
"Orlando Melville, or the Victim of the Press Gang," failed to produce
the desired soporific effect, and his thoughts soon recurred to their
former channel. Suddenly a violent concussion, a crashing, thumping,
and grating sound, the outcries of a hundred passengers,--the women
screaming, and some of the men not silent,--with a furious rocking and
tossing of the car, ejected every thought but one of his personal
safety. All sprang to their feet, he among the rest. The first
distinct impression which his mind received was that of the man in
front of him making a flying leap out of the open window of the car,
carrying the sash with him--a dexterous piece of gymnastics, only to
be accounted for by the fact that the performer was a distinguished
artist of the Grand National Olympic Circus. His boots twinkled at the
window, and he was gone, alighting on his feet like a cat, but Morton
was too much frightened to laugh. In a few moments the car came to a
rest, without being overturned, though the front was partly broken in,
and the whole swung off the rails to an angle of forty-five degrees.
On looking out at the window, the first object that met Morton's eye
was the baggage car, thrown on its side, with the door uppermost. As
he looked, the door opened, and a head emerged--like a triton from the
deep, or Banquo's ghost from a trap door--white with wrath and fright,
and swearing with wonderful volubility. Then appeared another, rising
by the side of the first, equally pallid, but much less profane. The
heads belonged to two men, who had been seated in the compartment of
the baggage car allotted to the mails, and when it was flung off the
track, had been rattled together like dice in a box, suffering various
bruises, but no serious harm. The breaking of the defective cast iron
axle of the tender had caused the whole disaster, which would
doubtless have produced fatal consequences had not the train been
moving at a very slow rate. As it happened, a few contusions were its
worst results, and one of the morning papers,
"for profound
And solid lying much renowned,"
solemnly averred that none but Providence was responsible for it.
There was abundant noise and vociferation. The passengers left the
train, some lending their bungling aid to repair the mischief, while
others withdrew to an inn which chanced to be in the neighborhood.
After looking for a time at the downfallen tender and the uprooted
rails, Morton, from some idle impulse, entered the car which he had
lately left. It was empty; and, passing through it, he looked into
that immediately behind, which had remained safely upon the rails.
This also was empty, with the exception of a single person, a young
female figure, seated at one of the windows. She was closely veiled,
yet there was in her air that indefinable something which told Morton
at a glance that she was a lady. He stepped to the ground,
conjecturing whether or no she had a companion.
Five minutes after, glancing at the window, he saw the solitary
traveller seated in the same position as before, and became convinced
that she was unattended. The women in the train had left it at the
outset. The busy and clamorous throng of men alone remained; and
Morton easily conceived that her situation must be an embarrassing
one. He therefore reentered the car and approached her.
"I am afraid we shall be detained here for two or three hours, and
perhaps till late at night. There is a public house a little way off,
to which the ladies in the train have gone. If you will allow me, I
will show you the way."
So he spoke; or, rather, so he would have spoken; but he had scarcely
begun when the veiled head was joyfully raised, and the veil was
thrown aside, disclosing to his astonished eyes the features of Edith
Leslie. She explained that she was on her way from her father's
country seat at Matherton; and that he was to meet her at the station
on the arrival of the train. When the accident took place, she had
been led to suppose, from the conversation of two men near her, that
the train would not be very long detained, and had preferred remaining
in the car to mingling with the tumultuous throng outside.
"It is too fine an afternoon," said Morton, as they left the spot, "to
be mured in that tavern. This lane has an inviting look. Have you a
mind to explore it?"
They walked accordingly in the direction he proposed; and, as they did
so, Morton cast many a stolen glance at the face of his companion. The
mind of the young philosopher was that day in a peculiarly susceptible
state. It seemed as if Fanny Euston had kindled within him a flame
which could not fix itself upon her, yet must needs find fuel
somewhere; and as his eye met that of Edith Leslie, he began to feel
that she held a deeper place in his thoughts than he had ever before
suspected.
By the side of the lane stood an ancient abode, whose rotten shingles
supported a rich crop of green mosses; and in the yard an old man, who
looked like a relic of Bunker Hill fight, was diligently chopping
firewood.
"What does this lane lead to?" asked Morton, looking over the fence.
The woodchopper leaned on his axe, wiped his brows with the tatters of
a red handkerchief, and seemed revolving the expediency of
communicating the desired information.
"Well," he returned, after mature reflection, "if you go fur enough,
it'll take you down to the Diamond Pool."
"The Diamond Pool," said Miss Leslie; "that has a promising sound."
The lane soon began to lead them down the side of a rugged hill,
between barberry bushes and stunted savins, with neglected stone
walls, where the striped ground squirrels chirruped as they dodged
into the crevices. In a few moments they had a glimpse of the water,
shining between the branches of the trees below.
"Upon my word," said Morton, as they stood on the margin, "the Diamond
Pool is not to be despised. We have chosen our walk well, and found a
tempting place of rest at the end of it."
"A grassy bank,--a clear spring, with cardinal flowers along the
edge--a cluster of maple trees----"
"And a flat rock at the foot of one of them, for you to rest upon. We
are well provided for."
"Except that a seat for you seems to have been forgotten."
"No, if I wish to rest, this mound of grass will serve my turn. I am
used to bivouacs."
The sun had just vanished behind the rocky hill on the farther side of
the water; a sea of liquid fire, clouds blazoned in gold and crimson,
betokened his recent presence. The lake lay like a great mirror framed
in green. Another sunset glowed in its depths; rocks, hills, and trees
grew downward; and the kingfisher, as he flitted over it, made a dash
at the surface, as if to peck at the adversary bird, which seemed
shooting upward to meet him.
"One might imagine," said Miss Leslie, "that we were a hundred miles
away from railroads, factories, and all abominations of the kind."
"They will follow soon," said Morton; "they are not far off. There is
no sanctuary from American enterprise."
"I know it is omnipotent at spoiling a landscape; but I hope that this
one may escape,--at least if there is no mill privilege in the
neighborhood."
"There is--an excellent one--at the outlet of the pond, beyond the
three elms yonder. I prophesy that in five years there will be a brick
factory on that meadow, with a row of one story houses for the
operatives."
"It will be a scandal and a profanation. It is too beautiful for such
base uses. But at least that old cedar tree, rooted in a cleft of the
precipice, has found a safe sanctuary. There it was growing in King
Philip's time; in its younger days it saw Indian wigwams standing on
this bank; and there its offspring will grow after it, safe from
Yankee axes."
"One cannot be sure of that. A time will come yet, when those rocks
will be blasted to build a town hall, or open another railroad track."
"But they cannot build railroads and factories in the clouds. Our New
England sunsets will still remain to remind one that there is an ideal
side of life--something in it besides locomotives and cotton gins."
"There it is that you are wiser than we are. You are mistresses of a
domain of which men, for the most part, know little or nothing."
"Pray what domain may that be?"
"One that is all mystery to me--a world of thoughts and sentiments
which to most men is a cloudland, an undiscovered country, of which
they may possibly recognize the existence, but of whose geography they
know nothing."
"Why should they be more ignorant of it than women?"
"Because they are commonly given over to practicalities, mixed
hopelessly with rivalries and ambitions. Even in their highest
pursuits, they propose to themselves some definite point to be gained,
some object to be achieved; but women are left to the world of their
own minds--there they can expatiate at will."
"That is a dangerous privilege."
"They have leisure to muse on the joys and troubles of life, and
explore depths which we bridge over."
"Either your mind has very much changed, or I have very much mistaken
it. Pardon me, but I fancied that you were like Iago, 'nothing if not
critical;' or at least that you sympathized with his slanderous
opinions of womankind."
"Heaven forbid! What treasonable thought did you suppose me to harbor
against the better part of humanity?"
"At all events, I never supposed you to believe that the better part
of humanity passed their leisure time in metaphysical reveries and
abstruse meditations."
"You were speaking, just now, of ideals. May not I have mine?"
"So your ideal woman is a transcendental philosopher, seated in the
midst of your undiscovered cloudland."
"Deliver me from such a one! My ideal is full of thought and of
feeling; but no one yet ever dreamed of branding her as a philosopher.
But why did you think me so very critical? I am hardly old enough yet
to make an Iago or a Rochefoucault."
"And yet you used always to have some saying of Rochefoucault at your
tongue's end."
"I detest him, nevertheless, for a French Mephistopheles,--and all his
tribe with him."
"When I said as much, you always told me that his sayings had a great
deal of truth in them."
"And have they not a great deal of truth?"
"I cannot pretend to know mankind well enough to answer; but I
sincerely hope, not much. Life would be worse than a blank if men and
women were what he represents them to be."
"I think not; for if one cannot learn to be enthusiastic in regard to
the actualities of human nature, he can console himself by a boundless
faith in its possibilities. And now and then, thank
God,--Rochefoucault to the contrary notwithstanding,--one finds the
possibility realized."
His companion made no reply; and Morton stood for a moment with his
eyes bent upon her face, which, to his enamoured fancy, seemed to
reflect the calm beauty of the landscape on which she was gazing. He
thought of Fanny Euston; he recalled his last evening's conversation
with her, and felt blindly impelled to give some form of expression to
the feeling which began to master him.
"Miss Leslie, were you ever in a storm at sea?"
"Yes, in a slight one; but the ship was strong; there was very little
danger."
"Then you were never flung about, as I have been, in an indifferent
egg shell of a craft, out of sight of land, at the mercy of winds and
waves."
"I did not know that you had been at sea. Ah, yes, you were at school
in France, when you were a boy--were you not?"
"Yes; but this happened since I have become a man, and not long ago. I
think I shall never forget it. The sun was bright at one moment, and
all was black as a hurricane the next. The wind came from every point
of the compass--always shifting, never resting. I had not an instant's
peace. It was all watching--all anxiety--and yet there was a kind of
pleasure in it. If I had had wings, I doubt if I should have found
heart to use them. It was a strange gale. It blew hot and cold by
fits; I thought I should lose my reckoning altogether, and be blown
away, body and soul."
"Really, I cannot imagine where your tempest is going to carry you."
"Nor could I; when, of a sudden, I found myself safe on shore. My good
star led me to a place beautiful as the May sunshine could make it; a
scene where art and nature were blended so harmoniously, that they
seemed to have grown together from the same birth; full of repose, and
tranquil, graceful power; such a scene, in short, as made me wish that
Nature would embody herself in a visible form, that I might swear
homage to her forever."
Had an interpreter been needed, Morton's look and voice must have
betrayed, at least, some part of his meaning. The color deepened
slightly on his companion's cheek, but she replied, without any
further sign of consciousness,--
"I never knew that you were quite so ardent a votary of nature. You
had better put your emotions into verse, and sell them to the
magazines, after the true poetic custom. In a little time, I don't
doubt, Dr. Griswold would find a place for you in his constellation of
poets."
"Ah," said Morton, "it is cruel of you to fling cold water on my
rhapsodies. But my flight is over. And now I will try my best to gain
the esteem in your eyes of a man of sense and a sound mind."
"And now those night-hawks over head are beginning to tell us that we
had better go back to the railroad. I suppose you will place it among
the other frailties of women; but I cannot help being a little afraid
that if we stay longer, that crippled train will run away and leave us
behind."
"Then good night to the Diamond Pool," said Morton, as they left the
place. "I shall not forget it; I owe it double thanks. It has shown me
a pretty landscape, and made me a wiser man."
"I can hardly see how that may be."
"It has taught me not to speak too earnestly with my friend, lest she
should banter me; and by no means to be drawn into any absurdity, lest
she should laugh at me outright."
"Do you mean that you thought that I laughed at you?"
"Did you not?"
"If I gave you cause to think that I did, I can only say, frankly and
heartily, that I am very sorry for it."
"Now I am emboldened to be absurd again, and speak more parables. I
have found a locked-up treasure--a sealed fountain. I long to open it,
but cannot."
"Your figures are too deep for me. I can make nothing of them."
"Then I will sink to plain prose. I have a friend whose heart is full
of warm feeling and earnest thought; but, out of reserve, or Heaven
knows what, she will express it to nobody but one or two intimate
companions. She tantalizes the rest with a bantering word; and
sometimes, when she is most in earnest, she seems to be most in jest.
But why do you smile?"
"Ask your friend Mr. Sharpe. He is your friend--is he not?"
"I suppose so, though he is old enough to be my father. But why should
I ask him?"
"Because he once described to me a person very much like the one you
have just described."
"Who was the person?"
"Mr. Sharpe said that, though he was in general quite frank and
undisguised, yet, if he were particularly in earnest on any subject,
he was apt to speak lightly of it, or perhaps ridicule it, to hide his
real feeling."
"Pray, who was this person? What was his name?"
"Mr. Vassall Morton."
"Did Sharpe say that of me? It is not a month since I was walking with
him,--his evening constitutional,--and he said the very same thing of
you. Now, as I hope to live an honest man, I was never half so much
flattered in my life, as by being slandered in such company."
Here he was interrupted abruptly, for, turning a corner, they came
full upon the inn, or hotel, as its sign proclaimed it to be.
Discontented male passengers were lounging about the bar room;
disconsolate female passengers sat, in bonnets and shawls, in the
parlor; and an unspeakable air of uneasiness and discomfort pervaded
the whole place.
"Our walk is over," sighed Morton; "I wish it had a more propitious
ending. And now let me be your courier, or do your commands in any
other capacity in which I can serve you."
At eleven o'clock that night the train rolled into the station house
at Boston, some four hours behind its time.
"My father will certainly be here," said Miss Leslie; but her father
was nowhere to be seen. Morton conducted her to a carriage. Her trunks
and his own had already been placed upon it, when, by the lantern of
one of the porters, Morton descried the agitated colonel threading the
crowd in anxious search of his daughter. He had been waiting nervously
since seven o'clock, and, when the train came in, had looked for her
in every place but the right one. Morton hastened to relieve his
fears.
"What do you mean to do with yourself to-night?" Leslie asked, as the
carriage drove towards his house.
"Drive to my house in the country."
"Your people will not expect you, and will be in bed before you can
get there. You had much better come home with me."
Morton was but too glad to accept the invitation.
Having bade good night to his host and his host's daughter, he passed
some hours in dreamy cogitation; then tried to sleep; but sleep long
kept aloof, the consciousness of being under the same roof with Edith
Leslie brought with it so strange a sensation. But as delicate health,
that grand auxiliary of sentiment, was quite unknown to him, nature
prevailed in the end, and at seven the next morning, a servant's knock
wakened him from a deep sleep, a vision of Mount Katahdin, and an
imaginary moose hunt.