THE VALE OF CEDARS;
or, The Martyr
BY GRACE AGUILAR,
AUTHOR OF "HOME INFLUENCE," "WOMAN'S FRIENDSHIP," ETC.
1851
"The wild dove hath her nest--the fox her cave--
Mankind their country--Israel but the grave."
BYRON.
MEMOIR OF GRACE AGUILAR.
Grace Aguilar was born at Hackney, June 2nd, 1816. She was the eldest
child, and only daughter of Emanuel Aguilar, one of those merchants
descended from the Jews of Spain, who, almost within the memory of
man, fled from persecution in that country, and sought and found an
asylum in England.
The delicate frame and feeble health observable in Grace Aguilar
throughout her life, displayed itself from infancy; from the age
of three years, she was almost constantly under the care of some
physician, and, by their advice, annually spending the summer months
by the sea, in the hope of rousing and strengthening a naturally
fragile constitution. This want of physical energy was, however, in
direct contrast to her mental powers, which developed early, and
readily. She learned to read with scarcely any trouble, and when once
that knowledge was gained, her answer when asked what she would like
for a present, was invariably "A book," which, was read, re-read,
and preserved with a care remarkable in so young a child. With the
exception of eighteen months passed at school, her mother was her sole
instructress, and both parents took equal delight in directing her
studies, and facilitating her personal inspection of all that was
curious and interesting in the various counties of England to which
they resorted for her health.
From the early age of seven she commenced keeping a journal, which was
continued with scarce any intermission throughout her life. In 1825
she visited Oxford, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Worcester, Ross, and Bath,
and though at that time but nine years old, her father took her to
Gloucester and Worcester cathedrals, and also to see a porcelain and
pin manufactory, &c., the attention and interest she displayed on
these occasions, affording convincing proof that her mind was alive
to appreciate and enjoy what was thus presented to her observation.
Before she had completed her twelfth year she ventured to try her
powers in composition, and wrote a little drama, called Gustavus Vasa,
never published, and only here recorded as being the first germ of
what was afterwards to become the ruling passion.
In September, 1828, the family went to reside in Devonshire for the
health of Mr. Aguilar, and there a strong admiration for the beauties
and wonders of nature manifested itself: she constantly collected
shells, stones, seaweed, mosses, &c., in her daily rambles; and not
satisfied with admiring their beauty, sedulously procured whatever
little catechisms or other books on those subjects she could purchase,
or borrow, eagerly endeavoring by their study, to increase her
knowledge of their nature and properties.
When she had attained the age of fourteen, her father commenced a
regular course of instruction for his child, by reading aloud, while
she was employed in drawing, needlework, &c. History was selected,
that being the study which now most interested her, and the first work
chosen was Josephus.
It was while spending a short time at Tavistock, in 1830, that the
beauty of the surrounding scenery led her to express her thoughts in
verse. Several small pieces soon followed her first essay, and she
became extremely fond of this new exercise and enjoyment of her
opening powers, yet her mind was so well regulated, that she never
permitted herself to indulge in original composition until her duties,
and her studies, were all performed.
Grace Aguilar was extremely fond of music; she had learned the piano
from infancy, and in 1831 commenced the harp. She sang pleasingly,
preferring English songs, and invariably selecting them for the beauty
or sentiment of the words; she was also passionately fond of dancing,
and her cheerful lively manners in the society of her young friends,
would scarcely have led any to imagine how deeply she felt and
pondered upon the serious and solemn subjects which afterwards formed
the labor of her life. She seemed to enjoy all, to enter into all, but
a keen observer would detect the hold that sacred and holy principle
ever exercised over her lightest act, and gayest hour. A sense of duty
was apparent in the merest trifle, and her following out of the divine
command of obedience to parents, was only equalled by the unbounded
affection she felt for them. A wish was once expressed by her mother
that she should not waltz, and no solicitation could afterwards tempt
her. Her mother also required her to read sermons, and study religion
and the Bible regularly; this was readily submitted to, first as a
task, but afterwards with much delight; for evidence of which we
cannot do better than quote her own words in one of her religious
works.
"This formed into a habit, and persevered in for a life, would in
time, and without labor or weariness, give the comfort and the
knowledge that we seek; each year it would become lighter, and more
blest, each year we should discover something we knew not before, and
in the valley of the shadow of death, feel to our heart's core that
the Lord our God is Truth."--_Women of Israel_, Vol. II, page 43.
Nor did Grace Aguilar only study religion for her own personal
observance and profit. She embraced its _principles_ (the principles
of all creeds) in a widely extended and truly liberal sense. She
carried her practice of its holy and benevolent precepts into every
minutiae of her daily life, doing all the good her limited means would
allow, finding time, in the midst of her own studies, and most
varied and continual occupations, to work for, and instruct her poor
neighbors in the country, and while steadily venerating and adhering
to her own faith, neither inquiring nor heeding the religious opinions
of the needy whom she succored or consoled. To be permitted to help
and comfort, she considered a privilege and a pleasure; she left the
rest to God; and thus bestowing and receiving blessings and smiles
from all who had the opportunity of knowing her, her young life flowed
on, in an almost uninterrupted stream of enjoyment, until she had
completed her nineteenth year.
Alas! the scene was soon to change, and trials awaited that spirit
which, in the midst of sunshine, had so beautifully striven to prepare
itself a shelter from the storm. The two brothers of Miss Aguilar,
whom she tenderly loved, left the paternal roof to be placed far from
their family at school. Her mother's health necessitated a painful and
dangerous operation, and from that time for several years, alternate
hopes and fears through long and dreary watchings beside the sick bed
of that beloved mother, became the portion of her gifted child. But
even this depressing and arduous change in the duties of her existence
did not suspend her literary pursuits and labors. She profited by all
the intervals she could command, and wrote the tale of the "Martyr,"
the "Spirit of Judaism," and "Israel Defended;" the latter translated
from the French, at the earnest request of a friend, and printed only
for private circulation. The "Magic Wreath," a little poetical work,
and the first our authoress ever published, dedicated to the Right
Honorable the Countess of Munster, also appeared about this time.
In the Spring of 1835, Grace Aguilar was attacked with measles, and
never afterwards recovered her previous state of health, suffering
at intervals with such exhausting feelings of weakness, as to become
without any visible disease really alarming.
The medical attendants recommended entire rest of mind and body; she
visited the sea, and seemed a little revived, but anxieties were
gathering around her horizon, to which it became evidently impossible
her ardent and active mind could remain passive or indifferent, and
which recalled every feeling, every energy of her impressible nature
into action. Her elder brother, who had long chosen music as his
profession, was sent to Germany to pursue his studies; the younger
determined upon entering the sea service. The excitement of these
changes, and the parting with both, was highly injurious to their
affectionate sister, and her delight a few months after, at welcoming
the sailor boy returned from his first voyage, with all his tales of
danger and adventure, and his keen enjoyment of the path of life he
had chosen, together with her struggles to do her utmost to share his
walks and companionship, contributed yet more to impair her inadequate
strength.
The second parting was scarcely over ere her father, who had long
shown symptoms of failing health, became the victim of consumption. He
breathed his last in her arms, and the daughter, while sorrowing over
all she had lost, roused herself once more to the utmost, feeling that
she was the sole comforter beside her remaining parent. Soon after,
when her brother again returned, finding the death of his father, he
resolved not to make his third voyage as a midshipman, but endeavor
to procure some employment sufficiently lucrative to prevent his
remaining a burthen upon his widowed mother. Long and anxiously did he
pursue this object, his sister, whose acquaintance with literary and
talented persons had greatly increased, using all her energy and
influence in his behalf, and concentrating all the enthusiastic
feelings of her nature in inspiring him with patience, comfort, and
hope, as often as they failed him under his repeated disappointments.
At length his application was taken up by a powerful friend, for her
sake, and she had the happiness of succeeding, and saw him depart
at the very summit of his wishes. Repose, which had been so long
necessary, seemed now at hand; but her nerves had been too long and
too repeatedly overstrung, and when this task was done, the worn and
weary spirit could sustain no more, and sank under the labor that had
been imposed upon it.
Severe illness followed, and though it yielded after a time to skilful
remedies and tender care, her excessive languor and severe headaches,
continued to give her family and friends great uneasiness.
During all these demands upon her time, her thoughts, and her health,
however, the ruling passion neither slumbered nor slept. She completed
the Jewish Faith, and also prepared Home Influence for the press,
though very unfit to have taxed her powers so far. Her medical
attendant became urgent for total change of air and scene, and again
strongly interdicted _all_ mental exertion--a trip to Frankfort, to
visit her elder brother, was therefore decided on. In June, 1847, she
set out, and bore the journey without suffering nearly so much as
might have been expected. Her hopes were nigh, her spirits raised--the
novelty and interest of her first travels on the Continent gave her
for a very transient period a gleam, as it were, of strength. For a
week or two she appeared to rally, then again every exertion became
too much for her, every stimulating remedy to exhaust her. She
was ordered from Frankfort to try the baths and mineral waters of
Schwalbach, but without success. After a stay of six weeks, and
persevering with exemplary patience in the treatment prescribed, she
was one night seized with alarming convulsive spasms, so terrible that
her family removed her next morning with all speed back to Frankfort,
to the house of a family of most kind friends, where every attention
and care was lavishly bestowed.
In vain. She took to her bed the very day of her arrival, and never
rose from it again; she became daily weaker, and in three weeks from
that time her sufferings ceased for ever. She was perfectly conscious
to within less than two hours before her death, and took an
affectionate leave of her mother and brother. Speech had been a
matter of difficulty for some time previous, her throat being greatly
affected by her malady; but she had, in consequence, learned to use
her fingers in the manner of the deaf and dumb, and almost the last
time they moved, it was to spell upon them feebly, "Though He slay me,
yet will I trust in Him."
She was buried in the cemetery of Frankfort, one side of which is set
apart for the people of her faith. The stone which marks the spot
bears upon it a butterfly and five stars, emblematic of the soul in
heaven, and beneath appears the inscription--
"Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her own works praise
her in the gates."--Prov. ch. xxxi, v. 31.
And thus, 16th September, 1847, at the early age of thirty-one, Grace
Aguilar was laid to rest--the bowl was broken, the silver cord was
loosed. Her life was short and checkered with pain and anxiety,
but she strove hard to make it useful and valuable, by employing
diligently and faithfully the talents with which she had been endowed.
Nor did the serious view with which she ever regarded earthly
existence, induce her to neglect or despise any occasion of enjoyment,
advantage, or sociality which presented itself. Her heart was ever
open to receive, her hand to give.
Inasmuch as she succeeded to the satisfaction of her fellow beings,
let them be grateful; inasmuch as she failed, let those who perceive
it deny her not the meed of praise, for her endeavor to open the path
she believed would lead mankind to practical virtue and happiness, and
strive to carry out the pure philanthropic principles by which she was
actuated, and which she so earnestly endeavored to diffuse.
OCTOBER, 1849.
THE VALE OF CEDARS;
OR,
THE MARTYR.
CHAPTER I.
"They had met, and they had parted;
Time had closed o'er each again,
Leaving lone the weary hearted
Mournfully to wear his chain."--MS.
A deliciously cool, still evening, had succeeded the intense heat of a
Spanish summer day, throwing rich shadows and rosy gleams on a wild,
rude mountain pass in central Spain. Massive crags and gigantic trees
seemed to contest dominion over the path, if path it could be called;
where the traveller, if he would persist in going onwards, could only
make his way by sometimes scrambling over rocks, whose close approach
from opposite sides presented a mere fissure covered with flowers and
brushwood, through which the slimmest figure would fail to penetrate;
sometimes wading through rushing and brawling streams, whose rapid
currents bore many a jagged branch and craggy fragment along with
them; sometimes threading the intricacies of a dense forest,
recognizing the huge pine, the sweet acorn oak, the cork tree,
interspersed with others of lesser growth, but of equally wild
perplexing luxuriance. On either side--at times so close that two
could not walk abreast, at others so divided that forests and streams
intervened--arose mountain walls seeming to reach the very heavens,
their base covered with trees and foliage, which gradually thinning,
left their dark heads totally barren, coming out in clear relief
against the deep blue sky.
That this pass led to any inhabited district was little probable, for
it grew wilder and wilder, appearing to lead to the very heart of the
Sierra Toledo--a huge ridge traversing Spain. By human foot it had
evidently been seldom trod; yet on this particular evening a traveller
there wended his solitary way. His figure was slight to boyishness,
but of fair proportion, and of such graceful agility of movement,
that the obstacles in his path, which to others of stouter mould and
heavier step might have been of serious inconvenience, appeared by him
as unnoticed as unfelt. The deep plume of his broad-rimmed hat could
not conceal the deep blue restless eyes, the delicate complexion, and
rich brown clustering hair; the varying expression of features, which
if not regularly handsome, were bright with intelligence and
truth, and betraying like a crystal mirror every impulse of the
heart--characteristics both of feature and disposition wholly
dissimilar to the sons of Spain.
His physiognomy told truth. Arthur Stanley was, as his name implied,
an Englishman of noble family; one of the many whom the disastrous
wars of the Roses had rendered voluntary exiles. His father and four
brothers had fallen in battle at Margaret's side. Himself and a twin
brother, when scarcely fifteen, were taken prisoners at Tewkesbury,
and for three years left to languish in prison. Wishing to conciliate
the still powerful family of Stanley, Edward offered the youths
liberty and honor if they would swear allegiance to himself. They
refused peremptorily; and with a refinement of cruelty more like
Richard of Gloucester than himself, Edward ordered one to the block,
the other to perpetual imprisonment. They drew lots, and Edwin Stanley
perished. Arthur, after an interval, succeeded in effecting his
escape, and fled from England, lingered in Provence a few months,
and then unable to bear an inactive life, hastened to the Court
of Arragon; to the heir apparent of which, he bore letters of
introduction, from men of rank and influence, and speedily
distinguished himself in the wars then agitating Spain. The character
of the Spaniards--impenetrable and haughty reserve--occasioned, in
general, prejudice and dislike towards all foreigners. But powerful
as was their pride, so was their generosity; and the young and lonely
stranger, who had thrown himself so trustingly and frankly on their
friendship, was universally received with kindness and regard. In men
of lower natures, indeed, prejudice still lingered; but this was
of little matter; Arthur speedily took his place among the noblest
chivalry of Spain; devoted to the interests of the King of Sicily, but
still glorying in the name and feeling of an Englishman, he resolved,
in his young enthusiasm, to make his country honored in himself.
He had been five years in Spain, and was now four and twenty; but
few would have imagined him that age, so frank and free and full of
thoughtless mirth and hasty impulse was his character. These last
fifteen months, however, a shadow seemed to have fallen over him, not
deep enough to create remark, but _felt_ by himself. His feelings,
always ardent, had been all excited, and were all concentrated, on a
subject so wrapt in mystery, that the wish to solve it engrossed his
whole being. Except when engaged in the weary stratagem, the rapid
march, and actual conflict, necessary for Ferdinand's interest, but
one thought, composed of many, occupied his mind, and in solitude so
distractingly, that he could never rest; he would traverse the country
for miles, conscious indeed of what he _sought_, but perfectly
unconscious where he _went_.
It was in one of these moods he had entered the pass we have
described, rejoicing in its difficulties, but not thinking where it
led, or what place he sought, when a huge crag suddenly rising almost
perpendicularly before him, effectually roused him from his trance.
Outlet there was none. All around him towered mountains, reaching
to the skies. The path was so winding, that, as he looked round
bewildered, he could not even imagine how he came there. To retrace
his steps, seemed quite as difficult as to proceed. The sun too had
declined, or was effectually concealed by the towering rocks, for
sudden darkness seemed around him. There was but one way, and Stanley
prepared to scale the precipitous crag before him with more eagerness
than he would a beaten path. He threw off his cloak, folded it in
the smallest possible compass, and secured it like a knapsack to his
shoulders, slung his sword over his neck, and, with a vigorous spring,
which conquered several paces of slippery rock at once, commenced the
ascent. Some brushwood, and one or two stunted trees, gave him now
and then a hold for his hands; and occasional ledges in the rock, a
resting for his foot; but still one false step, one failing nerve, and
he must have fallen backwards and been dashed to pieces; but to Arthur
the danger was his safety. Where he was going, indeed he knew not. He
could see no further than the summit of the crag, which appeared like
a line against the sky; but any bewilderment were preferable to the
strange stagnation towards outward objects, which had enwrapped him
ten minutes before.
Panting, breathless, almost exhausted, he reached the summit, and
before him yawned a chasm, dark, fathomless, as if nature in some wild
convulsion had rent the rock asunder. The level ground on which
he stood was barely four feet square; behind him sloped the most
precipitous side of the crag, devoid of tree or bush, and slippery
from the constant moisture that formed a deep black pool at its base.
Stanley hazarded but one glance behind, then looked steadily forward,
till his eye seemed accustomed to the width of the chasm, which did
not exceed three feet. He fixed his hold firmly on a blasted trunk
growing within the chasm; It shook--gave way--another moment and he
would have been lost; but in that moment he loosed his hold, clasped
both hands above his head, and successfully made the leap--aware only
of the immense effort by the exhaustion which followed compelling him
to sink down on the grass, deprived even of energy to look around him.
So marvellous was the change of scenery on which his eyes unclosed,
that he started to his feet, bewildered. A gradual hill, partly
covered with rich meadow grass, and partly with corn, diversified
with foliage, sloped downwards, leading by an easy descent to a small
valley, where orange and lime trees, the pine and chestnut, palm and
cedar, grew in beautiful luxuriance. On the left was a small dwelling,
almost hidden in trees. Directly beneath him a natural fountain threw
its sparkling showers on beds of sweet-scented and gayly-colored
flowers. The hand of man had very evidently aided nature in forming
the wild yet chaste beauty of the scene; and Arthur bounded down the
slope, disturbing a few tame sheep and goats on his way, determined on
discovering the genius of the place.
No living object was visible, however; and with his usual reckless
spirit, he resolved on exploring further, ere he demanded the
hospitality of the dwelling. A narrow path led into a thicker wood,
and in the very heart of its shade stood a small edifice, the nature
of which Arthur vainly endeavored to understand. It was square, and
formed of solid blocks of cedar; neither carving nor imagery of any
kind adorned it; yet it had evidently been built with skill and care.
There was neither tower nor bell, the usual accompaniments of a
chapel, which Stanley had at first imagined it; and he stood gazing
on it more and more bewildered. At that moment, a female voice of
singular and thrilling beauty sounded from within. It was evidently
a hymn she chanted, for the strain was slow and solemn, but though
_words_ were distinctly intelligible, their language was entirely
unknown. The young man listened at first, conscious only of increasing
wonderment, which was quickly succeeded by a thrill of hope, so
strange, so engrossing, that he stood, outwardly indeed as if turned
to stone; inwardly, with every pulse so throbbing that to move or
speak was impossible. The voice ceased; and in another minute a door,
so skilfully constructed as when closed to be invisible in the solid
wall, opened noiselessly; and a female figure stood before him.