gentleman about forty-five years of age, formerly engaged in commerce,
but now retired from business, in order that he may devote his whole
life, as well as the wealth which he had amassed, to the furtherance
of a project which he formed some sixteen years ago. This was no less
comprehensive a task than the compilation of a full history, as well
as a scientific account, of all that vast district west of the Rocky
Mountains, which, stretching from Panama to Alaska, embraces Central
America, Mexico, and California. It was to be in a popular form, and
to embrace every point of interest that could be ascertained respecting
the Pacific States, their aboriginal inhabitants, their successive
civilised occupiers, their geology, botany, and other natural features.
First of all in this stupendous task comes the history of the native
tribes--to be completed in five volumes, the first instalments of
which are already published by Messrs Appleton and Co. in New York,
and by Messrs Longmans in our own country. These will be followed by a
history of the States from the Spanish Conquest down to contemporary
times, and for this portion of the work it is thought that some twenty
volumes will be required. A third series will treat of the geological
structure of the territory, its minerals especially, and of mining
operations. Physical geography forms the fourth section of the proposed
work; whilst the fifth will deal with agriculture; and the sixth with
bibliography. It must be apparent that a man must be of a highly
sanguine temperament to imagine such an enterprise; it will be well if
he live to complete only a portion of it; and should he really succeed
in doing what he wishes, he will have earned for himself an honourable
distinction, and conferred on the world an extraordinary boon.
But how was such an undertaking to be begun? Where were the materials;
and even granting that they were to be procured, how was such a mass
of general reading as must be consulted, to be utilised? Mr Bancroft's
first step was to solve this difficulty. He decided to establish at
his own cost, in San Francisco, a library of reference, which should
contain all the books to be had for money which could throw any light
on the subject. With this end in view, he appointed agents in all the
principal cities of the world, whose business was to frequent sales,
examine book catalogues, and effect the purchase of any volumes which
seemed likely to contain useful information. Of course by such a system
many books were transmitted to headquarters which ultimately proved
to be of little or no value; but this was inevitable in the course of
purchases of such magnitude. And notwithstanding all drawbacks of the
kind, the collection has gradually increased, until it is said now to
consist of between eighteen and twenty thousand volumes, including
pamphlets; whether this number also includes manuscripts, we are unable
to say. The acquisition of these works has been occasionally furthered
by adventitious circumstances. The Mexican war, for instance, was the
means of throwing in Mr Bancroft's way some highly valuable documents,
which, under favourable circumstances, would have remained the property
of their lawful owners; these, contained in four volumes, are a set
of parchment records of the Church in Mexico between the years 1530
and 1583, and apart from their historical value, have an interest to
the bibliopolist as containing autographs of many celebrated men,
amongst others of Philip II., Torquemada, Las Casas, and Zumarraga,
first Archbishop of Mexico. This last-named worthy is notorious for
his act of insensate bigotry in destroying the Aztec records, and
thereby depriving the world of the history of that race; he burned the
hieroglyphic paintings of Anahuac in the public square of Tlatelolco,
much as Ximenes did with eighty thousand Moorish manuscripts in
Granada. These priceless records were stolen from the government
archives! When the unfortunate Emperor Maximilian's library was sold,
many valuable works were also obtained from that collection, which had
been gathered together during a lifetime by a well-known amateur, Count
Andrade.
The weakest part of the arrangement of Mr Bancroft's undertaking is
the manner in which the books are housed, but this is probably an
unavoidable evil; they occupy the fifth story of the owner's house in
Market Street, San Francisco, where they are exposed to all the risk of
fire, to say nothing of the inconvenience of such a plan. The apartment
in which they are kept occupies the whole length of the building, and
the books are arranged upon shelves reaching from the floor to the
ceiling, and running from one end of the room to the other. Let us now
see how it is proposed to utilise this mass of literature for reference.
No one but a resolute enthusiast with an abundance of means could have
brought this extraordinary project into shape. The trouble spent in the
undertaking has been enormous. Of course, the projector has a staff
of assistants possessing the requisite accomplishments, headed by a
librarian, Mr Oak, who has been indefatigable in producing a catalogue
of the works collected, with copious subordinate references. So aided,
Mr Bancroft, as we understand, has begun his literary operations; but
whether he will live to complete his colossal production in proper
artistic style must necessarily be left to conjecture. Fortunately,
besides being still in middle life, he is said to have splendid bodily
health and great powers of endurance, both of which must stand him
in good stead. He always writes at a standing desk, and sometimes
prolongs his hours of labour to as many as eleven or twelve--which seem
to us excessive. Such application may do for work which is chiefly
compilation; but any brain-worker knows that it is simply impossible to
do really valuable work throughout such a time. As a matter of fact,
very few men can read or write hard for more than six hours a day with
profitable result. Let us hope, however, that the man who has had
courage to undertake such a task, will have self-restraint enough not
to endanger its success by an undue straining of the faculties, which
must be kept in full repair to insure its accomplishment. We should be
sorry to hear that any disaster from fire had put an abrupt termination
to so well-meaning, though we may be allowed to call it a somewhat
eccentric undertaking.
GORDON.
She came on towards me, her trailing draperies falling round her
with the soft grace she gave to all she touched. Sunshine was on her
beautiful hair--evening sunshine, which turned the wreath of plaits
she wore into a crown of burnished gold. She came floating on, through
the flower and fruit gemmed orange trees, through the crimson and pure
white camellia bloom; violets grew beneath her feet, and she seemed to
me part of the glory and the fragrance of the sunset and the blossoms.
Below the terrace where I stood, lay the sea, where blue faded to
green, and green to opal, melting into one deep far-stretching mystery
of purple light and banks of golden cloud. Palaces and domes and
tapering spires shone white against the dark background of distant
mountains. Suddenly the music of many bells rung out on the still air,
their chiming softened by distance into low faint sweetness. They
were the bells of the stately marble city that shone so fair across
her gleaming bay. The first bell-notes were taken up and echoed by
the bells of chapels in villages along the shore; of convents hidden
away in country dells and valleys, till the air was full of lingering
prayerful sound. Through it, through the magical Italian twilight came
the woman I loved. She came and stood beside me, looking across the
water to where Genoa's palaces glimmered against the sky; but I do not
think she saw or thought of them. There was a dreamy look in her eyes,
a cold, set weariness about her mouth, which is only seen in those
whose thoughts have drifted far from where they stand.
'Are you tired of this place?' I at length ventured to ask her.
'Not particularly,' she answered; 'you know I never care much where I
am.' The words sound petulant; but said as she said them, they were
only weary. I should have been glad if she had ever shewn impatience;
anything rather than the cold quiet which ever lay upon her beauty like
a pall. At first, in my triumphant happiness at having won her promise
to be my wife, this coldness had not chilled me--as it sometimes did
now--to the heart. I so longed, so hungered for a word of love, for a
tender look. All her stately beauty would soon be mine, and it seemed
still as far from me as ever.
We leaned on the low parapet of the terrace, while the music of the
bells died away, till only the slow beating of the waves broke the
stillness. It was an hour of wonderful peace and beauty, yet a strange
sense of unrest took possession of me, and jarred the music of the
waves and the restful quiet of the twilight. Standing there close to
her, with the certainty that soon she would be my own for ever, a vague
thrill of fear came over me, a fear lest all this feverish joy of
knowing she was mine, might vanish away, and leave me a lonely mortal.
This love for her had become to me an all-absorbing passion; and yet
she never for one moment allowed me to think that my love was returned.
Perhaps it was the might of her beauty that filled my senses; yet I
have seen beautiful women since, and had seen them before I first saw
her on the walls above the old Etruscan gateway at Perugia.
* * * * *
One morning the week before, I had strolled out from the dull hotel;
and leaving the street with its tall houses and quaint old fountain,
glowing in the day's first freshness, I sauntered on to the walls, and
there I first saw her. Below in the valley the silvery olive leaves
trembled in the sunshine; wreaths of broad-leaved vines clung to the
gray old trees, clothing them with a borrowed beauty of youth and
freshness. Hundreds of flowers blushed in the light, and varied odours
from herb and blossom filled the air with a subtle languor. Above,
on the lichen-covered wall, with a background of purple mountain, a
fitting frame to her stately loveliness, she sat, looking out across
the sunlit land, with the dreary far-away look in her great deep eyes,
and the haughty coldness upon her chiselled face. I lingered about,
drinking draughts of beauty; fancying it was my artistic sense that
kept me there watching her face, till she rose wearily, and slowly
walking down the street, entered the hotel where I was staying.
I found on inquiry that a Mrs Vereker and her niece, Miss Mayne, had
arrived there the previous evening. I had sometimes met Mrs Vereker
in London; and later on in the day, while I was carelessly examining
the carving on the fountain in the square I saw her and my vision of
the morning standing on the cathedral steps. Mrs Vereker came forward
with that friendliness we feel for a slight home acquaintance whom we
may chance to meet when abroad. So I joined them, and we strolled on
chatting over home news. Miss Mayne seldom spoke, and yet that walk
seemed to me a strangely happy one. Mrs Vereker told me they had only
been a day in Perugia, and had intended going on at once to Rome;
but the mountain air and mountain views were so delightful, they had
changed their minds, and intended remaining for some time at Perugia.
I had come to the old town to study art; to search the blazoned
manuscripts lying hidden in sacristy and convent, and learn from them
their secrets of colour and design; to wander through frescoed church
and palace, where walls and ceilings are brilliant still as when the
hands which wove their gorgeous stories first laid the pencil down and
thanked God for the great consoler--Art. I had come to watch the mists
rising from the valleys, and wrapping the mountains in soft mystery
of cloud--cloud which changes and shifts, and melts at last into the
golden and purple, the opaline green of the sunrise; so that I might
try to wrest from Nature a faint touch of her magic of shadow and
light, of colour and form, and lay it at the feet of the one mistress I
had ever known--Art.
What I was now studying was a woman's heart--and what I learned
was--nothing. I do not think mine is an impressionable nature. I had
spent thirty years in the world, and had never loved any woman until I
saw Mary Mayne in the morning light sitting above that old gateway; yet
in one short week I had grown to love her--well, as few women are ever
loved.
At the end of that week came a letter from Willie Vereker, saying his
yacht needed some repairs, and he would put in at Genoa for a few days
if his mother could meet him there. He had been to the East, and she
had not seen him for some time; so she decided on going back to Genoa;
hoping the _Gwendoline_ might need more repairing than Willie thought,
and keep him there longer than he expected. The evening of the day Mrs
Vereker received that letter, I told her of my love for her niece, and
asked permission to accompany them to Genoa.
She regarded me with an odd look of compassion. 'Have you spoken to
Mary yet?' she asked.
I told her I had not; I wished to wait until we had known each other
longer; I feared being too precipitate.
'Then,' said Mrs Vereker, 'I have no right to tell you anything of her
story. It is a sad one, poor child! and I warn you, you have little
chance of success. If you choose, you can come with us to Genoa; but if
I were you, I should not do so. Save yourself while you can. You have
known her a very short time. If you leave us now, you will soon forget
her; later, you may find it a more difficult task.'
I shook my head. The advice came too late. I went with them to Genoa.
The stately marble city had a charm for us all. Mrs Vereker had her
son, and the two found marvellous attractions in the quaint narrow
streets with their palace portals, their courts and halls, where
fountains sparkled and flung diamonds of spray round the brows of pure
fair statues; where in the coolness and the shadow, gold-laden orange
trees and thick masses of crimson blossom gleamed with sudden startling
glory.
I had my idol. Day after day I was by her side. It was a fool's
Paradise perhaps; but I suppose there is such an Eden in every life;
and looking back, when we have left its short-lived peace, we vainly
long for a single throb of its rapture. So, during those quiet days at
Genoa, each of us, except Mary Mayne, had our heart's desire: Willie,
the life, the colour, the loveliness he and his _Gwendoline_ sought in
voyages to many lands; Mrs Vereker, her son; I, my new delirious joy.
There, on the terrace where we were standing, I first spoke to Mary,
and heard her tell me my love was hopeless. She told me her story.
Her wedding-day had been fixed. In a year she was to have been married
to a man she loved with her whole heart; when the war with Russia broke
out, and Gordon Frazer's regiment was ordered to the Crimea. He and
Mary wished to be married before he left, but family reasons prevented
it, and so they parted. He had never returned to England. A soldier
brought Mary a little locket which she had given Gordon. The ribbon
it hung upon was thickened here and there with deep dark stains; and
the man said Gordon Frazer had given it to him to take to Mary, when
the young officer lay dying after the charge at Balaklava. It was
only the story of many an English and many a Russian girl during that
dreadful time. When a strong, self-contained nature breaks down, it is
almost utter collapse; so it was with Mary. For months she lay silent,
tearless, listlessly unable to make the slightest exertion, to take the
smallest interest in life. Her friends thought her brain had suffered
from the shock; and when she recovered sufficiently to travel, Mrs
Vereker had taken her abroad, where they had been moving from place to
place ever since. Her body regained health; she was now quite strong;
but the girl's heart and soul seemed dead; as she said, dead, and
buried in Gordon Frazer's grave. Yet as I listened I did not despair.
I had no living rival; he was dead, this man she loved; while my heart
was beating, living, and strong with its worship of her. If I could
only win her to be my wife, the dead love would pale and faint before
my real and passionate devotion. So I hoped, as day by day I watched
her every look, forestalled her every wish, until she grew accustomed
to my presence, and to rely upon my care. My hopes were answered; ere
long I won her reluctant consent to be my wife, but on the condition
that our marriage should not take place until their return to England
next year.
The rosy clouds were fading into the deep purple of Italian night.
Silence fell around us as a mantle; only the throb of the sea below
the terrace broke the intense quiet. Out on the sea shone the white
sails of a little yacht. Nearer, within the harbour, rose the masts and
spars of many ships, mysterious, spectre-like, as ships always look at
night. As we were seated in calm enjoyment of the scene, a small boat
shot out from the rocks beneath our feet, where lay some hidden cave or
landing-place. It was rowed by two men; a third sat wrapped in a large
cloak in the stern. They rowed well, and the boat was nearly a mile
from us, leaving a bright line of light upon the shining water, when a
cry broke the calm of the night--a wild, weird cry, with agony in its
tone. 'Gordon!' I have never heard its like since, and I hope I never
shall again. In its agonised tone I could scarcely recognise the voice
of Mary, so changed was it, so shrill with long pent-up yearning, as it
wailed out that one word--'Gordon!' The cry seemed to be repeated again
and again, though softened by the echoes, while the little boat sped
on its way, and its passengers--mere dark specks they seemed--climbed
into the yacht. The white sails gleamed against the horizon, and then,
phantom-like, were lost in its dim purple.
I turned and looked at Mary. She stood with her eyes fixed on the
darkness which hid the yacht from sight, her hands clasped upon her
heart, her face drawn and colourless. I feared the fate her friends
dreaded for her had stricken her as she stood beside me there in
the still luxurious twilight. 'Mary, my dearest, my own! what is
it?'--taking her hand and drawing her closer.
She drew her hand from mine, and shuddering away from me, leaned
against the stone parapet, resting her head on the cold marble coping.
'You are ill; let me take you home, darling,' I said.
'No,' she murmured; 'not ill. But oh,' she exclaimed, 'Harry, Harry! my
good kind friend, help me! _Gordon was near us just now._ I felt it; I
am sure of it. You will help me to find him; will you not?'
Help her to find him! help to break my own heart--to bruise this
new-found sweetness out of my life! The very thought struck me with
a sudden chill. What if this fancy of hers, coming so close upon my
sure forebodings, should be a reality? What if Gordon Frazer were
still in existence? I thrust the thought from me as I should thrust a
temptation. 'I will help you in any way I can, my darling,' I said;
'but come in now; the night-air is chilling; and you are giving way to
feverish fancies.'
'No,' she said; 'it is no fancy.' Drawing herself up wearily, she
turned without looking at me; and I followed her down the terrace and
across the marble court of the old palace which was our home in Genoa.
I watched her glide, stately and pale and quiet, up the broad white
staircase.
It was months before she recovered from the brain-fever in which she
awoke next morning--such awful months, during which we often feared
the worst. Yet when they were over, and she was among us again, paler,
more fragile, but still her own beautiful self, stately, self-possessed
as usual, I was almost thankful for the terrible illness, which proved
that her cry and wild words on the terrace were but warnings of coming
illness, the mere wandering of a brain diseased.
* * * * *
The Roman season was nearly over, yet Rome was full--full of English
sightseers, like ourselves; full of Americans, on rapid flight across
Europe; of eastern prelates, in flowing eastern robes, with olive-hued
eastern faces; of eager-faced French ladies, and solemn-eyed peasants
from lonely villages on the Campagna, and of Italians from city and
from plain; for it was Easter-time. We were only waiting until the
conclusion of the festivities to set out on our journey home. Home! I
never until now felt half the meaning of that word. When we got home,
Mary and I would be married. I should give up wandering, and settle
down into a country gentleman. I thought with a pang of self-reproach
of the grand old home which called me master, shut up in desolate state
since my dear father died. How a fair young mistress would brighten and
beautify the old rooms. I could see it all now--the oaken hall with
its quaint old pictures; spring sunshine pouring in at the open door,
red-coated sportsmen grouped under the beeches, horns ringing from the
copses, children playing under the shadow of the avenue of limes--the
loveliness of joyous life, where for so long had been the silence left
by death. It was a sunny dream of home--home in fair England, into
which I had fallen; standing there, upon the Pincian, under the deep
dark blue of Roman night.
Below lay the city, its narrow streets dimly mysterious, no light
visible in their tall houses; the fountain murmured its sweet
monotonous music in the Piazza di Spagna; the wide white marble steps
gleamed along the hillside; tall palm-trees cast weird shadows across
the gravelled walks; nightingales answered each other in low rich
trills of song, echoing from tree to tree, through whispering palms and
odorous night-flowers. Beside me, cold and silent, was the woman whose
charmful spell woke within me this new sweet longing for home--home
musical with the soft rustling of women's garments; with the tender
voices of little children. I suppose such a dream and such a longing
come to all men at some time of their lives; it came to me that night
as I stood above the city of vanished glories, of dead and buried
dreams.
It did not last long. Suddenly, above the city roofs, a cross of
silvery light shone out against the sky. The illumination of Saint
Peter's had begun. Above the winding narrow streets, above palace
roofs, above palm and cypress, above triumphal arch and mouldering
temple, over the palace of the Cæsars, over Capitol and Forum, the
silvery cross shone glad, triumphant; and from it, the light spread
from window to window, from pillar to pillar, till the vast pile was
one glory, changing rapidly from soft silvery radiance into a glow of
golden fire.
'It was worth coming to see. Was it not, Mary?'
'Mary!' A stranger's voice echoed her name; and instead of answering
my question, she sprang with a low cry from my side, and laid her head
upon a stranger's breast. 'Did you not get my letters? I have been
looking everywhere for you,' I heard him say.
She did not answer, nor raised her head; as if at last she had found
her rest.
'You are not alone here?' he went on. 'Who are you with?'
Then with a quiver as of pain, she raised herself, and looked from me
to him with beseeching eyes and trembling clasped hands.
Before she spoke--for even in all the agony of my crushed-out hopes, my
love for her bore down all other feelings, and I tried to save her from
the pain of telling me what I already knew--I said: 'You have found
an older friend than I am, Mary. Shall I leave him to take you to Mrs
Vereker?'
'An older friend?' he repeated. 'By Jove! I should think so.'
Then raising his hat, he shook hands with me as I turned away.
I turned into the darkness, but not before I had seen that until now I
had never known her, my love, my promised wife. I had known a beautiful
statue, not the beautiful woman who, with eyes upraised to his, stood
in the subdued light looking up to Gordon Frazer. All the coldness, all
the stately calm had gone, fallen from her as a mantle falls--a mantle
which had hidden the fullness of her loveliness, and had concealed from
me a tender grace and beauty I had never till now beheld. I have never
seen her since.
* * * * *