Alice.
I will own you as my prince
In the sight of heaven,
For I've loved you ever since
I was six or seven.
In consequence of her daughter's incriminating blush, Mrs. Martin set
herself to the not uncommon task of locking a stable door after the
steed has been stolen. But it was too late. Alice loved Paul
Seaton, and felt that to be with him and to hear his voice was ideal
happiness. As for Paul, he liked his old playmate because she
thought him infallible and because she was pleasant to look upon; but
his time for love was not yet.
Men and women approach the great subject of love by such different
roads. The normal woman begins her life by raising an altar to an
unknown god, and dedicates it to the first handsome stranger who
comes her way, as the niche over the shrine is generally what
shop-keepers call "stock size". Worship is the leading motive of her
existence: the particular idol whom she happens to adore is a mere
matter of circumstance.
But with a man it is different. In his case the goddess appears
prior to the altar; and it is only after he has met and fallen down
before the one, that he recognizes the necessity of erecting the
other.
Alice Martin was an extremely pretty girl; and reminded one of a
picture by Romney, with her soft brown hair and eyes to match. She
was also sweet and good and restful; and possessed the power of
making happy any man who happened to love her. She also possessed
the power of loving almost any man--provided that he was kind and
agreeable, and always on the spot: for--let poets and novelists say
what they will in favour of manly beauty and manly prowess--it is not
the man of war or the man of genius that carries the day with the
majority of women, but the man who happens to be on the spot.
"I don't think Miss Alice is looking well; do you, Martha?" asked
Joanna of her faithful handmaid one day.
"Far from it, miss, far from it. I passed the remark only the other
day to Mrs. Martin's cook, that Miss Alice had just the same look
that my niece Keren-happuch Tozer had; and in three weeks after that,
Keren-happuch was a corpse," assented Martha cheerfully.
Joanna suppressed a smile. "Oh! I don't think she is as bad as
that, Martha; but she looks to me as if she were fretting about
something."
"May be she is, my dear. The heart knoweth its own bitterness, as
Solomon said; and a wounded spirit is as a broken tooth, as it were."
"I sometimes wonder if she is in love with Paul," remarked Paul's
sister thoughtfully.
"Well, to be sure, miss, what an idea! Yet Master Paul is a likely
enough lad for any maid to fancy, bless his heart!"
"Falling in love seems a great bother, don't you think, Martha?"
"I should just think it is, my dear, and no mistake. I'm thankful to
say I always kept clear of rubbish of that kind. I've had too much
to do, what with preparing your dear papa's meals, and keeping the
circuit's furniture in good order, to waste my time in thinking of
men and love and fallals of that sort."
"I have made up my mind that I shall never marry," said Joanna.
"And I, for one, don't blame you; for what with throwing matches into
the grates, and walking on the carpets with muddy boots, and sitting
on the antimacassars and crumpling them up, there's nothing makes as
much dirt in a house as a man. They are far worse than dogs or
children, in my opinion."
"Besides," mused Joanna, "I am not pretty enough to get married."
"Bless you, my dear, that's neither here nor there! If Providence
ordains that you'll be married, married you'll be, if you've got a
face like a turnip and a figure like a bolster. As I once passed the
remark to my sister Eliza Ann--'Eliza Ann,' says I, 'you're the
plainest woman I ever set eyes on, and you've got the best husband:
which is nothing short of a miracle'."
Joanna smiled. "Did not Eliza Ann feel hurt at your saying that?"
"Not she: Eliza Ann was far too godly a woman to care for such an
earthly snare as beauty, or to spend her days in plaiting her hair
and putting on of apparel, like the beasts that perish."
"Where is Eliza Ann now?" asked Joanna.
"She went with her husband to Australia some years ago."
"Do you often hear from her?"
"Now and again, miss, when she has the time; but what with one thing
and another her days are pretty full. She and her husband wanted me
to go out and join them at one time; but I said that unless they
could promise that I should sleep every night on land in a four-post
bed, I would not undertake the journey. It may be all very well to
go travelling by day, when you can see where you are going to; but
travelling by night is only for such as love darkness rather than
light because their deeds are evil."
Joanna Seaton had an admirable sense of humour; and therefore always
encouraged Martha when the latter was inclined, like the moon, to
take up her wondrous tale, and relate the story of her earlier
experiences.
"Your sister, Eliza Ann, must have been a woman of strong character,"
said Joanna suggestively.
"Indeed she was, my dear, and no mistake. She was such a leading
light in the Grampton circuit that it was considered due to her piety
to ask her to do the cutting-out at the Dorcas-meeting. But piety
and cutting-out don't always go together, more's the pity!"
"I suppose they don't."
"Far from it. There was once great distress in Grampton, owing to
bad trade coupled with a deep snow; and Brother Phipson gave a roll
of cloth to make clothes for ragged little boys; Brother Phipson
being a cloth-merchant by nature and a circuit-steward by grace."
"It was very kind of him to give garments to the poor," said Joanna
approvingly.
"He was but an unprofitable servant, like the rest of us," sighed
Martha: "when we have done all we can, our righteousness is but
filthy rags hanging on barren fig-trees."
"Did your sister cut out all the little boys' clothes?"
"Well, it was in this way, miss. Eliza Ann was such a saint that it
would not have been seemly for any other member of the congregation
to do the cutting-out while she was present. So she was appointed to
the work. But her mind was so full of the last Sunday evening's
sermon, that she cut out all the trousers for the same leg."
Joanna laughed outright. "I suppose she was in a great way when she
found out what she had done."
"Not she, my dear," replied Martha, somewhat reprovingly, "Eliza Ann
was far too religious a woman to own to anybody but her Maker that
she had been in the wrong."
"Then what did she do?"
"She said what she had done she had done for the best, but it was
always her fate to be misunderstood, so she supposed she must take it
as her cross and not complain. She had endeavoured not to let her
left hand know what her right hand was doing, and this was the
consequence. Oh! she was terribly hurt, was Eliza Ann--and no
wonder!--when the young minister told her that, according to his
ideas, trousers (like opinions) should not be one-sided. It was so
painful, she said, when men reviled her and condemned her, after she
had acted as she thought for the best."
"What was the end of it all?" Joanna asked.
"The end was, miss, that Brother Phipson heard what had happened, and
gave another roll of cloth to make the other legs; so that all things
worked together for good, and there was double the number of pairs
that there would have been if the cutting-out had not been done by
Eliza Ann."
"She really must have been a gifted person!"
"Oh! Eliza Ann was a godly woman, and no mistake," confessed Martha,
with pardonable pride, "and still is, I doubt not, a sea-voyage
having no power to change the human heart. But she was none too easy
to get on with, when things were going smooth. Though I say it as
shouldn't--being her sister--there were times when Eliza Ann's
religion was trying to the flesh of them she had to do with."
"Did her husband think it so?" queried Joanna.
"Oh, my dear, what a question to ask! As if it mattered what he
thought! Eliza Ann was far too sensible to allow him to give his
opinion about anything. 'If you let a husband begin to pass
remarks,' she used to say, 'it is the thin end of the wedge which in
time will turn again and rend you.' So Eliza Ann avoided the first
appearance of evil."
"But she was really good, you say?"
"Good, my dear? Of course she was good! Who ever thought anything
different?" exclaimed Martha, who had never read Milton's line, "He
for God only; she for God in him," and would have called it "rubbish"
if she had. "I assure you, miss, Eliza Ann was not one to keep the
outside of the cup and platter clean, while the inside was filled
with ravening wolves and dead men's bones. Though she might be
aggravating, as it were, in times of prosperity, in the day of
adversity she never failed nor fell short."
Joanna nodded.
"Now, in the case of Mr. Sweeting," continued Martha, "him that so
far forgot himself as to say that trousers should be two-sided, you
know. As long as he waxed fat and kicked, and was filled with pride
and vainglory, Eliza Ann would have nothing to say to him. But when
he fell sick of the small-pox, and there was no woman to look after
him--his mother being dead, and his step-mother living at such a
distance and caring more for the things of this life than for her
husband's first family (which was all sons)--Eliza Ann went and
nursed him herself, and if it had not been for her the poor young man
would have died."
"Did she escape the infection?" asked Joanna anxiously.
"Not she. As soon as Mr. Sweeting was pretty well, Eliza Ann caught
the complaint and had a terrible time. And when she got well again
she found her face was disfigured, and her beautiful hair all cut
off."
"Oh, how sad!" cried Joanna. "Was she pretty before her illness?"
"No, my dear; far from it. She was always a plain woman at the best
of times, but the small-pox left her positively ugly. She really had
had beautiful hair; but when it grew again it all came grey. Perhaps
her hair, being her one beauty, might have proved a snare to her; so
the Lord saw fit to remove it, lest she herself--having saved
others--should become a castaway."
"Did she mind much when she found her face was so disfigured?" Joanna
asked: "and did she regret what she had done?"
"Never once, miss. Eliza Ann is not one of the regretting sort. She
does what she thinks right, and leaves Providence to take the
consequences. The first time I saw her after her illness, 'My
conscience alive, Eliza Ann,' says I, 'you are a figure of fun!'
'Martha,' says she, 'the Lord called me to nurse that poor, misguided
young man; and was I going to let the thought of my vile body come
between me and the Lord's work?' That was how Eliza Ann looked at
the matter; and it was the sensible view to my thinking."
Joanna's eyes filled with tears; self-sacrifice--even in Eliza
Anns--always touched her.
"I hope you said something comforting to your sister, Martha."
"Yes, miss, I did, and something edifying too, I trust. 'Eliza Ann,'
says I, 'if you have been ugly here, you will be handsome enough in
heaven, never fear. Much beauty you never had; but, such as it was,
you gave it to the Lord, and He will pay it back in His own good
time!'"
"Then do you think that what we give up here will be made up to us
hereafter?"
"Certainly so," replied Martha cheerfully: "the Lord tells us in His
Holy Word to owe no man anything; so it isn't likely that He will
remain in debt Himself. Trust Him, if we give Him our health or
wealth or beauty, it will be repaid, some thirty, some sixty, and
some an hundred-fold."
"I wonder if we shall all be beautiful in heaven?" said Joanna.
"Of course we shall, my dear, if we want to be," replied Martha, "if
the Lord lets us wish for anything very much, He means to fulfil that
wish, either in this world or the next, or else He would never let us
go on wishing it."
"Then do you think that every one will be made good-looking in
heaven?"
"I do, Miss Joanna. It will be a big job with some of us, I admit;
but the Lord will manage it, never fear."
"Still it seems wrong and selfish, somehow, to wish very much for
beauty," persisted Joanna, who, being younger and less wise than her
mother, was addicted to argument. "Mrs. Martin was talking about
this the other day, and she said she considered the mere desire to be
beautiful was a form of sinful vanity."
"Perhaps she is of a contented disposition, and has brought her mind
to her circumstances, as the saying is," suggested Martha, who always
scented battle at the mere mention of Mrs. Martin. This excellent
lady had a wonderful knack of teaching people their place--a form of
education which does not add to the popularity of the instructor.
"She said that wealth was a higher gift than beauty," continued
Joanna thoughtfully, "because it could be used for the benefit of
others, while beauty was only a personal possession; and she told me
that she had often felt it right to pray to the Lord for riches,
because she needed them to carry on His work."
"She never took Him in with that, I'll be bound," murmured Martha,
with an ominous shake of the head; "but it was just like her to try
it on."
"I suppose we ought not to mind whether we are rich or poor, or
handsome or plain," mused Joanna aloud; "for this life is, after all,
only an anteroom to the next one. Our happiness or unhappiness here
is really a question of no moment; what really matters is whether we
are using our happiness or unhappiness as a fit preparation for the
life to come."
"Quite true, my dear," commented Martha; "as long as sick folk get
well, it doesn't signify to them whether they are cured by sweet
syrups or by bitter drugs. It is the cure that matters, not the
medicine."
Joanna nodded her head approvingly: Martha's uncompromising sense of
justice always appealed to her.
"Them as think too much of this present life and all its vanities,"
continued Martha, "remind me of my poor father, the first time he
travelled by rail. It was to see his sister who lived at Folwich.
'Now, Joshua,' says mother to him, 'whatever you do, don't sit down
on them comfortable seats and fall asleep, but remember that you are
a stranger and a sojourner.' 'All right, missis,' says father; and
then--like a man--did exactly the opposite to what he'd been told.
Oh! they are tiresome creatures, men are. If you look after their
health, they say you are fussy; and if you don't, they are all dead
corpses. Eh! but there is no peace for a married woman, save in the
grave; and not even there, I doubt, unless he has been took first,
and so she knows he is out of harm's way."
"Then don't you think that men are able to take care of themselves?"
asked Joanna.
"My conscience alive, miss! You, who have got a father of your own,
to ask such a question as that! Still there is some excuse for you,
seeing that your father is a minister, and so not quite like other
men. But even a call to the ministry don't make a man equal to a
woman, to my thinking; though it is better than nothing, as you may
say."
"What happened to your father on his first journey? That is what you
were telling me."
"So I was, miss, so I was. Well, as I was saying, mother told father
not to make himself too comfortable on his journey, or worse would
come of it. She owned afterwards that she had been foolish not to
see that forbidding a thing was just suggesting to him to do it, and
putting fresh mischief into his head; for the moment she forgot she
was speaking to a man, and treated him as a reasonable being--which
she ought to have known better, being a married woman."
"Then did he disobey her?" inquired Joanna.
"Naturally, my dear, he did. No sooner did father start on his
journey, out of reach of mother's eye, than he sat down on them seats
and went fast asleep, and he didn't wake up again till he'd gone five
stations past Folwich."
"Oh dear!"
"It was 'oh dear!' and no mistake; for he had to wait at Brayford
four hours for the next train back, and then had to come straight
home again without seeing his sister at all, besides having to pay
the extra fare, which came to five and threepence. Mother said he
was a type of them that have their portion in this life, and are so
busy making the best of the wilderness that they pass by the promised
land without even seeing the name of the station."
So Joanna and her old nurse--like the true Methodists that they
were--talked familiarly together about holy things; and this
familiarity arose not from any lightness or irreverence, but from the
fact that to them such things were so near and so real that they
became as household words.
The Methodists of the past generation lived always with their lamps
lit and their loins girded, as those that wait for their Lord; and
they sought so diligently for the True that they had no leisure to
look for the Beautiful, for it had not yet been revealed to them that
the True and the Beautiful are one. They were so fearful of
confounding the substance with the shadow that they did not
altogether realize that the shadow is after all but the reflection of
the substance, and therefore a revelation of the same; and they gazed
so steadfastly into heaven that they were in danger of forgetting how
God made the earth as well as the heavens and saw that it was good.
To their ears there was no message in the wind or the earthquake or
the fire; but they heard clearly the still small Voice, and they did
whatsoever it commanded them.
And we need not pity them overmuch that some of the beauty and poetry
of life was hid from their eyes. They that seek first the kingdom of
God and His righteousness know no abiding lack; for all these things
shall be added unto them.
Now it happened that Martha was not the only person who had noticed
Alice's delicate appearance. Alice's mother had likewise perceived
it, and it had struck a cold chill to the maternal heart; for human
nature is stronger than worldly ambition or religious prejudice--is
stronger in fact than most things--and human nature has much that is
good in it, as well as much that is not quite so good. Therefore
Mrs. Martin's comfortable view of life--with an equally comfortable
view of heaven in the background--lost all its beauty and symmetry
when her careful eye perceived a tiny hollow appearing in Alice's
cheek. Nevertheless the hollow remained, as "Paul Seaton his mark,"
and Mrs. Martin was powerless to remove it.
As for Paul himself, he was too much occupied with books and boating
and such important matters to notice whether a girl's cheek were thin
or the reverse; and he would have been extremely surprised and
annoyed to learn that he possessed the right to excavate in so
delicate a field; for in his second year at Oxford he became captain
of his college boat, having proved his prowess on the river; and he
was happier then than he ever had been, or probably ever would be
again.
To Paul Seaton rowing was no mere pastime; at that time it was to him
a sign and type of all that was best in life and human nature; and
though in after years the type changed, the thing which rowing then
represented was ever the greatest thing in the world to Paul.
"I cannot understand how you can care so much about an amusement,"
said Joanna one day, as she and Paul and Alice were sitting in the
garden at The Cedars.
Paul flushed. "It isn't just an amusement; to me it is a lot more
than that."
"I don't see how amusement can be anything more than amusement,"
persisted Joanna. "And to care too much about a pastime seems to me
as wrong as to care too much about pleasure."
"Oh! can't you understand?" cried her brother. "Can't you see that
in boating, as in everything else in life, there is considerably more
than the thing itself? Of course rowing is a glorious exercise, and
a fellow thoroughly enjoys it; but besides that, there is the _esprit
de corps_, and the desire to have one's boat first on the river, and
all that sort of thing, don't you know?"
"I see," said Alice.
"I don't think you girls realize how awfully it matters to a fellow
that his college boat should be first. Why, I've seen men get soaked
through, and yet forget all about themselves, and not care a rap how
cold and damp they were--nor how ill they made themselves--as long as
their boat won."
"I know," said Alice.
Now, as a matter of fact, Alice did not know one bit better than
Joanna did; but she used her eyes much and her tongue little, and
consequently had the reputation of being an extremely sympathetic
young person. She had a pretty way of looking interested and of
saying, "Yes, I know"; and women who do these things are beloved both
by their own sex and the other. Alice was not insincere in thus
doing. Her sympathy extended over a far wider area than her
comprehension; and her eyes were truthful in the interest they
expressed, though her brain did not grasp the why and wherefore of
this interest.
Alice felt more than she understood, and Joanna understood more than
she felt; consequently--and deservedly--Alice won more love from her
kind than Joanna did; for the world is fair to people as a rule, and
with what measure they mete it is measured to them withal. To a
woman a heart is a more remunerative investment than a head, and a
much more satisfactory possession; yet women are slow to perceive
this. If only the women who have sufficient wit to say nasty things,
had just so much more wit as would prevent them from saying the same,
the world would be a pleasanter place, and the men who have married
stupid wives would have less cause for self-congratulation than they
have at present. For in a woman--as in a lemon--bitterness is an
unpardonable defect; men, on the contrary--like grouse--are all the
nicer for a flavour of it.
"To me," remarked Joanna obstinately, "rowing is merely a violent
form of the 'bodily exercise' which 'profiteth little'; I cannot see
anything else in it. I can understand that a man should want his own
college to produce the best scholars in the university; but I cannot
see how it can matter whether his boat is first on the river or not."
Paul groaned. "It is the firstness that matters, don't you see?
whether it applies to the schools or the river."
"I see no credit in being first in mere physical things," said
Joanna, who was small and weak.
"Well, I do then," replied Paul, who was tall and strong.
"I think it is nice to do things well, whether they are physical or
mental," added Alice, who was amiable.
"It is awfully jolly to feel you are in good form," replied Paul,
pinching his biceps.
"I'd far rather be a genius than the strongest man in the world,"
said his sister.
"Would you?" argued Paul. "I can't say that I would. I'd rather
have been Achilles in the thick of the fight, than Homer writing
about him. Still success in anything is a fine thing--about the
finest thing in the world, I suppose--and it must be glorious for a
man to feel himself a head and shoulders above his fellows in any
sphere!"
"You think too much about success," said Joanna gravely; "the great
thing, it seems to me, is to do one's duty, and not bother about the
results. I can imagine failure's being a better thing than success,
under certain circumstances."
Paul shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I can't; and at any rate I hope
my portion in life will be the inferior one you call success."
"I am sure it will be," added Alice, "you are so awfully clever that
there is no doubt that you will succeed in whatever you undertake,
just as you have done in the boating."
"Which, as I said before, doesn't seem to me a sort of success worth
having," said the unbending Joanna.
Joanna laboured under a not uncommon delusion that there is a special
virtue in upholding any opinion in the face of opposition; and that
the oftener one reiterates the opinion, and the more unacceptable it
is, the greater is the virtue. To the masculine mind this habit of
thought is trying; and Paul found it specially so when it ran right
across his boyish enthusiasms. Though he was as yet too young to
know all that he had learnt, the river had already taught him more
than the schools; it had shown him the necessity for self-imposed
discipline, implicit obedience, regular work, strong endurance, stern
self-denial and unity of aim and interest; and even if he were unable
as yet to realize all this--still less to express it--Joanna's
disapproval of his greatest delight partook of the nature of
sacrilege in Paul's eyes.
"It's no use talking to you of things which you don't understand," he
said crossly; Paul's temper--like canal bridges--never being equal to
bearing more than "the ordinary traffic of the district".
"I don't wonder that you enjoy rowing so much, Paul, for it must be
so nice on the river these lovely afternoons," interpolated Alice,
ever ready to make peace.
But Paul was not so easily appeased. "Nice on the river!" he
grumbled, "what an expression! Girls never have an idea of anything
better or higher than what they call nice."
Which was very unjust, as well as very disagreeable; for Joanna's
visions of duty and Alice's dreams of love were quite equal, from an
ethical point of view, to Paul's heroics; but of course Paul did not
know this. If he had, he would have been thirty instead of twenty,
and wise at that.
"If I were a man I should love to be big and strong," persisted the
peacemaker. "It seems just as right for a man to be strong as for a
woman to be beautiful."
"I wonder if beautiful women are much happier than plain ones,"
remarked Joanna.
"Of course they are," replied Alice, "because people love them more,
and love is the only thing that really makes a woman happy."
Joanna shook her head. "I don't see that. Your own people will love
you whether you are plain or whether you are pretty; and it seems to
me to have a lot of outsiders fond of you would be a bother rather
than a pleasure."
"But don't you like people to be fond of you?" asked Alice.
"Not unless I am fond of them. When comparative strangers kiss me
and gush over me I feel so dreadfully uncomfortable I don't know what
to do. There was a very gushing woman in our last circuit who used
to hold my hand for hours together."
"I shouldn't have minded that," said Alice.
Joanna laughed. "But I did: I was simply paralyzed with terror;
every time she gave my hand a squeeze, I squeezed back; and if my
squeeze hadn't been quite as hard as hers, I felt as if I were in
debt and ought to be county-courted."
Paul was dreadfully bored by this style of conversation. He was not
sufficiently in love with Alice to care to discuss emotions with her;
for a man does not like to talk about feelings, except to the woman
he happens to be in love with--and then he only does it to please
her, and wishes to goodness she would select some other topic.
It was a very happy life at Chayford just then, especially to Joanna.
Each day was full--but not too full--of duties; and nearly every
evening there was some mild religious excitement to take the
minister's family out, and prevent life from ever seeming dull.
There were the week-evening service and the class-meeting and the
prayer-meeting and the Dorcas-meeting--four full nights for certain;
and there often came little irregular and extra means of grace for
the other evenings of the week; so that every day there was the
pleasant feeling that something was going to happen after tea.
This cheerful and busy type of existence exactly suited Joanna; it
satisfied her completely, and she had no longings for anything
different--neither much patience with the people who had.
But Alice dreamed dreams of a fuller life, which was not hers at all,
but Paul's; a life devoted to adoring Paul when he succeeded, and
adoring him still more when he failed. She was content to stand afar
off among the crowd who were eager to crown Paul as victor in the
days of his triumph, if only she might have the right to come near
and comfort him in times of failure and humiliation. She fully
believed that Paul was one of the greatest men alive, and would prove
himself such to the world in general; but she would not have loved
him a whit less--but rather more--had she thought him doomed to fail
in everything that he undertook. Paul was Paul--that was enough for
her; if the world did not do him justice, so much the worse for the
world.
As for Paul himself, he knew nothing of Alice's girlish devotion to
him, and would not have thanked her for it if he had. He meant to
succeed; so the love that beareth all things and never faileth, was
not an article for which he had any use. The admiration that success
is bound to command was more in his line at present; and that, of
course, one demands as one's right, and never thanks anybody for. To
Paul just then the love that endures and is patient was as
uninteresting as chrysanthemums and china-asters would be in spring.
There comes a time when we cherish chrysanthemums and
china-asters--even of the most ordinary sort; but that is not till
the violets and the roses and the lilies are all faded.