Ah me! for aught that ever I could read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth!
--Midsummer Night’s Dream.
The celebrated passage which we have prefixed to this chapter has, like
most observations of the same author, its foundation in real experience.
The period at which love is formed for the first time, and felt most
strongly, is seldom that at which there is much prospect of its being
brought to a happy issue. The state of artificial society opposes many
complicated obstructions to early marriages; and the chance is very
great, that such obstacles prove insurmountable. In fine, there are few
men who do not look back in secret to some period of their youth, at
which a sincere and early affection was repulsed, or betrayed, or become
abortive from opposing circumstances. It is these little passages of
secret history, which leave a tinge of romance in every bosom, scarce
permitting us, even in the most busy or the most advanced period of
life, to listen with total indifference to a tale of true love.
Julian Peveril had so fixed his affections, as to insure the fullest
share of that opposition which early attachments are so apt to
encounter. Yet nothing so natural as that he should have done so. In
early youth, Dame Debbitch had accidentally met with the son of her
first patroness, and who had himself been her earliest charge, fishing
in the little brook already noticed, which watered the valley in
which she resided with Alice Bridgenorth. The dame’s curiosity easily
discovered who he was; and besides the interest which persons in her
condition usually take in the young people who have been under their
charge, she was delighted with the opportunity to talk about former
times--about Martindale Castle, and friends there--about Sir
Geoffrey and his good lady--and, now and then, about Lance Outram the
park-keeper.
The mere pleasure of gratifying her inquiries, would scarce have had
power enough to induce Julian to repeat his visits to the lonely glen;
but Deborah had a companion--a lovely girl--bred in solitude, and in the
quiet and unpretending tastes which solitude encourages--spirited, also,
and inquisitive, and listening, with laughing cheek, and an eager eye,
to every tale which the young angler brought from the town and castle.
The visits of Julian to the Black Fort were only occasional--so far
Dame Deborah showed common-sense--which was, perhaps, inspired by the
apprehension of losing her place, in case of discovery. She had, indeed,
great confidence in the strong and rooted belief--amounting almost to
superstition--which Major Bridgenorth entertained, that his daughter’s
continued health could only be insured by her continuing under the
charge of one who had acquired Lady Peveril’s supposed skill in treating
those subject to such ailments. This belief Dame Deborah had improved
to the utmost of her simple cunning,--always speaking in something of an
oracular tone, upon the subject of her charge’s health, and hinting
at certain mysterious rules necessary to maintain it in the present
favourable state. She had availed herself of this artifice, to procure
for herself and Alice a separate establishment at the Black Fort; for it
was originally Major Bridgenorth’s resolution, that his daughter and her
governante should remain under the same roof with the sister-in-law of
his deceased wife, the widow of the unfortunate Colonel Christian. But
this lady was broken down with premature age, brought on by sorrow;
and, in a short visit which Major Bridgenorth made to the island, he
was easily prevailed on to consider her house at Kirk-Truagh, as a
very cheerless residence for his daughter. Dame Deborah, who longed
for domestic independence, was careful to increase this impression by
alarming her patron’s fears on account of Alice’s health. The mansion of
Kirk-Truagh stood, she said, much exposed to the Scottish winds, which
could not but be cold, as they came from a country where, as she was
assured, there was ice and snow at midsummer. In short, she prevailed,
and was put into full possession of the Black Fort, a house which, as
well as Kirk-Truagh, belonged formerly to Christian, and now to his
widow.
Still, however, it was enjoined on the governante and her charge, to
visit Kirk-Truagh from time to time, and to consider themselves as
under the management and guardianship of Mistress Christian--a state
of subjection, the sense of which Deborah endeavoured to lessen, by
assuming as much freedom of conduct as she possibly dared, under the
influence, doubtless, of the same feelings of independence, which
induced her, at Martindale Hall, to spurn the advice of Mistress
Ellesmere.
It was this generous disposition to defy control which induced her to
procure for Alice, secretly, some means of education, which the stern
genius of puritanism would have proscribed. She ventured to have her
charge taught music--nay, even dancing; and the picture of the stern
Colonel Christian trembled on the wainscot where it was suspended,
while the sylph-like form of Alice, and the substantial person of Dame
Deborah, executed French _chaussées_ and _borrées_, to the sound of
a small kit, which screamed under the bow of Monsieur De Pigal, half
smuggler, half dancing-master. This abomination reached the ears of
the Colonel’s widow, and by her was communicated to Bridgenorth, whose
sudden appearance in the island showed the importance he attached to the
communication. Had she been faithless to her own cause, that had been
the latest hour of Mrs. Deborah’s administration. But she retreated into
her stronghold.
“Dancing,” she said, “was exercise, regulated and timed by music; and it
stood to reason, that it must be the best of all exercise for a delicate
person, especially as it could be taken within doors, and in all states
of the weather.”
Bridgenorth listened, with a clouded and thoughtful brow, when,
in exemplification of her doctrine, Mistress Deborah, who was no
contemptible performer on the viol, began to jangle Sellenger’s Round,
and desired Alice to dance an old English measure to the tune. As
the half-bashful, half-smiling girl, about fourteen--for such was
her age--moved gracefully to the music, the father’s eye unavoidably
followed the light spring of her step, and marked with joy the rising
colour in her cheek. When the dance was over, he folded her in his arms,
smoothed her somewhat disordered locks with a father’s affectionate
hand, smiled, kissed her brow, and took his leave, without one single
word farther interdicting the exercise of dancing. He did not himself
communicate the result of his visit at the Black Fort to Mrs. Christian,
but she was not long of learning it, by the triumph of Dame Deborah on
her next visit.
“It is well,” said the stern old lady; “my brother Bridgenorth hath
permitted you to make a Herodias of Alice, and teach her dancing. You
have only now to find her a partner for life--I shall neither meddle nor
make more in their affairs.”
In fact, the triumph of Dame Deborah, or rather of Dame Nature, on this
occasion, had more important effects than the former had ventured to
anticipate; for Mrs. Christian, though she received with all formality
the formal visits of the governante and her charge, seemed thenceforth
so pettish with the issue of her remonstrance, upon the enormity of
her niece dancing to a little fiddle, that she appeared to give up
interference in her affairs, and left Dame Debbitch and Alice to manage
both education and housekeeping--in which she had hitherto greatly
concerned herself--much after their own pleasure.
It was in this independent state that they lived, when Julian first
visited their habitation; and he was the rather encouraged to do so by
Dame Deborah, that she believed him to be one of the last persons in the
world with whom Mistress Christian would have desired her niece to be
acquainted--the happy spirit of contradiction superseding, with Dame
Deborah, on this, as on other occasions, all consideration of the
fitness of things. She did not act altogether without precaution
neither. She was aware she had to guard not only against any reviving
interest or curiosity on the part of Mistress Christian, but against the
sudden arrival of Major Bridgenorth, who never failed once in the year
to make his appearance at the Black Fort when least expected, and
to remain there for a few days. Dame Debbitch, therefore, exacted of
Julian, that his visits should be few and far between; that he should
condescend to pass for a relation of her own, in the eyes of two
ignorant Manx girls and a lad, who formed her establishment; and that
he should always appear in his angler’s dress made of the simple
_Loughtan_, or buff-coloured wool of the island, which is not subjected
to dyeing. By these cautions, she thought his intimacy at the Black Fort
would be entirely unnoticed, or considered as immaterial, while, in the
meantime, it furnished much amusement to her charge and herself.
This was accordingly the case during the earlier part of their
intercourse, while Julian was a lad, and Alice a girl two or three years
younger. But as the lad shot up to youth, and the girl to womanhood,
even Dame Deborah Debbitch’s judgment saw danger in their continued
intimacy. She took an opportunity to communicate to Julian who Miss
Bridgenorth actually was, and the peculiar circumstances which placed
discord between their fathers. He heard the story of their quarrel
with interest and surprise, for he had only resided occasionally at
Martindale Castle, and the subject of Bridgenorth’s quarrel with his
father had never been mentioned in his presence. His imagination caught
fire at the sparks afforded by this singular story; and, far from
complying with the prudent remonstrance of Dame Deborah, and gradually
estranging himself from the Black Fort and its fair inmate, he frankly
declared, he considered his intimacy there, so casually commenced, as
intimating the will of Heaven, that Alice and he were designed for each
other, in spite of every obstacle which passion or prejudice could
raise up betwixt them. They had been companions in infancy; and a little
exertion of memory enabled him to recall his childish grief for the
unexpected and sudden disappearance of his little companion, whom he was
destined again to meet with in the early bloom of opening beauty, in a
country which was foreign to them both.
Dame Deborah was confounded at the consequences of her communication,
which had thus blown into a flame the passion which she hoped it would
have either prevented or extinguished. She had not the sort of head
which resists the masculine and energetic remonstrances of passionate
attachment, whether addressed to her on her own account, or on behalf of
another. She lamented, and wondered, and ended her feeble opposition,
by weeping, and sympathising, and consenting to allow the continuance of
Julian’s visits, provided he should only address himself to Alice as a
friend; to gain the world, she would consent to nothing more. She was
not, however, so simple, but that she also had her forebodings of the
designs of Providence on this youthful couple; for certainly they could
not be more formed to be united than the good estates of Martindale and
Moultrassie.
Then came a long sequence of reflections. Martindale Castle wanted but
some repairs to be almost equal to Chatsworth. The Hall might be allowed
to go to ruin; or, what would be better, when Sir Geoffrey’s time came
(for the good knight had seen service, and must be breaking now), the
Hall would be a good dowery-house, to which my lady and Ellesmere might
retreat; while (empress of the still-room, and queen of the pantry)
Mistress Deborah Debbitch should reign housekeeper at the Castle, and
extend, perhaps, the crown-matrimonial to Lance Outram, provided he was
not become too old, too fat, or too fond of ale.
Such were the soothing visions under the influence of which the dame
connived at an attachment, which lulled also to pleasing dreams, though
of a character so different, her charge and her visitant.
The visits of the young angler became more and more frequent; and the
embarrassed Deborah, though foreseeing all the dangers of discovery, and
the additional risk of an explanation betwixt Alice and Julian, which
must necessarily render their relative situation so much more delicate,
felt completely overborne by the enthusiasm of the young lover, and was
compelled to let matters take their course.
The departure of Julian for the continent interrupted the course of
his intimacy at the Black Fort, and while it relieved the elder of its
inmates from much internal apprehension, spread an air of languor and
dejection over the countenance of the younger, which, at Bridgenorth’s
next visit to the Isle of Man, renewed all his terrors for his
daughter’s constitutional malady.
Deborah promised faithfully she should look better the next morning, and
she kept her word. She had retained in her possession for some time a
letter which Julian had, by some private conveyance, sent to her
charge, for his youthful friend. Deborah had dreaded the consequences
of delivering it as a billet-doux, but, as in the case of the dance, she
thought there could be no harm in administering it as a remedy.
It had complete effect; and next day the cheeks of the maiden had a
tinge of the rose, which so much delighted her father, that, as he
mounted his horse, he flung his purse into Deborah’s hand, with the
desire she should spare nothing that could make herself and his daughter
happy, and the assurance that she had his full confidence.
This expression of liberality and confidence from a man of Major
Bridgenorth’s reserved and cautious disposition, gave full plumage to
Mistress Deborah’s hopes; and emboldened her not only to deliver another
letter of Julian’s to the young lady, but to encourage more boldly and
freely than formerly the intercourse of the lovers when Peveril returned
from abroad.
At length, in spite of all Julian’s precaution, the young Earl became
suspicious of his frequent solitary fishing parties; and he himself, now
better acquainted with the world than formerly, became aware that his
repeated visits and solitary walks with a person so young and
beautiful as Alice, might not only betray prematurely the secret of his
attachment, but be of essential prejudice to her who was its object.
Under the influence of this conviction, he abstained, for an unusual
period, from visiting the Black Fort. But when he next indulged himself
with spending an hour in the place where he would gladly have abode
for ever, the altered manner of Alice--the tone in which she seemed
to upbraid his neglect, penetrated his heart, and deprived him of
that power of self-command, which he had hitherto exercised in their
interviews. It required but a few energetic words to explain to Alice
at once his feelings, and to make her sensible of the real nature of her
own. She wept plentifully, but her tears were not all of bitterness. She
sat passively still, and without reply, while he explained to her, with
many an interjection, the circumstances which had placed discord between
their families; for hitherto, all that she had known was, that Master
Peveril, belonging to the household of the great Countess or Lady of
Man, must observe some precautions in visiting a relative of the unhappy
Colonel Christian. But, when Julian concluded his tale with the warmest
protestations of eternal love, “My poor father!” she burst forth, “and
was this to be the end of all thy precautions?--This, that the son of
him that disgraced and banished thee, should hold such language to your
daughter?”
“You err, Alice, you err,” cried Julian eagerly. “That I hold this
language--that the son of Peveril addresses thus the daughter of your
father--that he thus kneels to you for forgiveness of injuries which
passed when we were both infants, shows the will of Heaven, that in our
affection should be quenched the discord of our parents. What else could
lead those who parted infants on the hills of Derbyshire, to meet thus
in the valleys of Man?”
Alice, however new such a scene, and, above all, her own emotions, might
be, was highly endowed with that exquisite delicacy which is imprinted
in the female heart, to give warning of the slightest approach to
impropriety in a situation like hers.
“Rise, rise, Master Peveril,” she said; “do not do yourself and me this
injustice--we have done both wrong--very wrong; but my fault was done in
ignorance. O God! my poor father, who needs comfort so much--is it for
me to add to his misfortunes? Rise!” she added more firmly; “if you
retain this unbecoming posture any longer, I will leave the room and you
shall never see me more.”
The commanding tone of Alice overawed the impetuosity of her lover, who
took in silence a seat removed to some distance from hers, and was again
about to speak. “Julian,” said she in a milder tone, “you have spoken
enough, and more than enough. Would you had left me in the pleasing
dream in which I could have listened to you for ever! but the hour of
wakening is arrived.” Peveril waited the prosecution of her speech as a
criminal while he waits his doom; for he was sufficiently sensible that
an answer, delivered not certainly without emotion, but with firmness
and resolution, was not to be interrupted. “We have done wrong,” she
repeated, “very wrong; and if we now separate for ever, the pain we may
feel will be but a just penalty for our error. We should never have met:
meeting, we should part as soon as possible. Our farther intercourse
can but double our pain at parting. Farewell, Julian; and forget we ever
have seen each other!”
“Forget!” said Julian; “never, never. To _you_, it is easy to speak the
word--to think the thought. To _me_, an approach to either can only be
by utter destruction. Why should you doubt that the feud of our
fathers, like so many of which we have heard, might be appeased by our
friendship? You are my only friend. I am the only one whom Heaven has
assigned to you. Why should we separate for the fault of others, which
befell when we were but children?”
“You speak in vain, Julian,” said Alice; “I pity you--perhaps I pity
myself--indeed, I should pity myself, perhaps, the most of the two; for
you will go forth to new scenes and new faces, and will soon forget
me; but, I, remaining in this solitude, how shall _I_ forget?--that,
however, is not now the question--I can bear my lot, and it commands us
to part.”
“Hear me yet a moment,” said Peveril; “this evil is not, cannot be
remediless. I will go to my father,--I will use the intercession of my
mother, to whom he can refuse nothing--I will gain their consent--they
have no other child--and they must consent, or lose him for ever. Say,
Alice, if I come to you with my parents’ consent to my suit, will you
again say, with that tone so touching and so sad, yet so incredibly
determined--Julian, we must part?” Alice was silent. “Cruel girl, will
you not even deign to answer me?” said her lover.
“I would refer you to my father,” said Alice, blushing and casting her
eyes down; but instantly raising them again, she repeated, in a firmer
and a sadder tone, “Yes, Julian, I would refer you to my father; and you
would find that your pilot, Hope, had deceived you; and that you had but
escaped the quicksands to fall upon the rocks.”
“I would that could be tried!” said Julian. “Methinks I could persuade
your father that in ordinary eyes our alliance is not undesirable. My
family have fortune, rank, long descent--all that fathers look for when
they bestow a daughter’s hand.”
“All this would avail you nothing,” said Alice. “The spirit of my father
is bent upon the things of another world; and if he listened to hear you
out, it would be but to tell you that he spurned your offers.”
“You know not--you know not, Alice,” said Julian. “Fire can soften
iron--thy father’s heart cannot be so hard, or his prejudices so strong,
but I shall find some means to melt him. Forbid me not--Oh, forbid me
not at least the experiment!”
“I can but advise,” said Alice; “I can forbid you nothing; for, to
forbid, implies power to command obedience. But if you will be wise, and
listen to me--Here, and on this spot, we part for ever!”
“Not so, by Heaven!” said Julian, whose bold and sanguine temper scarce
saw difficulty in attaining aught which he desired. “We now part,
indeed, but it is that I may return armed with my parents’ consent. They
desire that I should marry--in their last letters they pressed it more
openly--they shall have their desire; and such a bride as I will present
to them has not graced their house since the Conqueror gave it origin.
Farewell, Alice! Farewell, for a brief space!”
She replied, “Farewell, Julian! Farewell for ever!”
Julian, within a week of this interview, was at Martindale Castle, with
the view of communicating his purpose. But the task which seems easy at
a distance, proves as difficult, upon a nearer approach, as the fording
of a river, which from afar appeared only a brook. There lacked not
opportunities of entering upon the subject; for in the first ride which
he took with his father, the Knight resumed the subject of his son’s
marriage, and liberally left the lady to his choice; but under the
strict proviso, that she was of a loyal and an honourable family;--if
she had fortune, it was good and well, or rather, it was better than
well; but if she was poor, why, “there is still some picking,” said Sir
Geoffrey, “on the bones of the old estate; and Dame Margaret and I will
be content with the less, that you young folks may have your share of
it. I am turned frugal already, Julian. You see what a north-country
shambling bit of a Galloway nag I ride upon--a different beast, I wot,
from my own old Black Hastings, who had but one fault, and that was his
wish to turn down Moultrassie avenue.”
“Was that so great a fault?” said Julian, affecting indifference, while
his heart was trembling, as it seemed to him, almost in his very throat.
“It used to remind me of that base, dishonourable Presbyterian fellow,
Bridgenorth,” said Sir Geoffrey; “and I would as lief think of a
toad:--they say he has turned Independent, to accomplish the full degree
of rascality.--I tell you, Gill, I turned off the cow-boy, for gathering
nuts in his woods--I would hang a dog that would so much as kill a hare
there.--But what is the matter with you? You look pale.”
Julian made some indifferent answer, but too well understood, from the
language and tone which his father used, that his prejudices against
Alice’s father were both deep and envenomed, as those of country
gentlemen often become, who, having little to do or think of, are but
too apt to spend their time in nursing and cherishing petty causes of
wrath against their next neighbours.
In the course of the same day, he mentioned the Bridgenorth to his
mother, as if in a casual manner. But the Lady Peveril instantly
conjured him never to mention the name, especially in his father’s
presence.
“Was that Major Bridgenorth, of whom I have heard the name mentioned,”
said Julian, “so very bad a neighbour?”
“I do not say so,” said Lady Peveril; “nay, we were more than once
obliged to him, in the former unhappy times; but your father and he took
some passages so ill at each other’s hands, that the least allusion
to him disturbs Sir Geoffrey’s temper, in a manner quite unusual, and
which, now that his health is somewhat impaired, is sometimes alarming
to me. For Heaven’s sake, then, my dear Julian, avoid upon all occasions
the slightest allusion to Moultrassie, or any of its inhabitants.”
This warning was so seriously given, that Julian himself saw that
mentioning his secret purpose would be the sure way to render it
abortive, and therefore he returned disconsolate to the Isle.
Peveril had the boldness, however, to make the best he could of what had
happened, by requesting an interview with Alice, in order to inform her
what had passed betwixt his parents and him on her account. It was with
great difficulty that this boon was obtained; and Alice Bridgenorth
showed no slight degree of displeasure, when she discovered, after much
circumlocution, and many efforts to give an air of importance to what
he had to communicate, that all amounted but to this, that Lady
Peveril continued to retain a favourable opinion of her father, Major
Bridgenorth, which Julian would fain have represented as an omen of
their future more perfect reconciliation.
“I did not think you would thus have trifled with me, Master Peveril,”
said Alice, assuming an air of dignity; “but I will take care to avoid
such intrusion in future--I request you will not again visit the Black
Fort; and I entreat of you, good Mistress Debbitch, that you will no
longer either encourage or permit this gentleman’s visits, as the result
of such persecution will be to compel me to appeal to my aunt and father
for another place of residence, and perhaps also for another and more
prudent companion.”
This last hint struck Mistress Deborah with so much terror, that she
joined her ward in requiring and demanding Julian’s instant absence,
and he was obliged to comply with their request. But the courage of
a youthful lover is not easily subdued; and Julian, after having gone
through the usual round of trying to forget his ungrateful mistress, and
entertaining his passion with augmented violence, ended by the visit to
the Black Fort, the beginning of which we narrated in the last chapter.
We then left him anxious for, yet almost fearful of, an interview with
Alice, which he prevailed upon Deborah to solicit; and such was the
tumult of his mind, that, while he traversed the parlour, it seemed
to him that the dark melancholy eyes of the slaughtered Christian’s
portrait followed him wherever he went, with the fixed, chill, and
ominous glance, which announced to the enemy of his race mishap and
misfortune.
The door of the apartment opened at length, and these visions were
dissipated.