fpeane ata ip oa Sypitesares ij See ye yore ape fig Modeyed of 0B) auth ag pies ait ronramreriontess eh ‘t ay, See a ae ae ee ct 7. RE s eat the af ie pareeertes phe eo No Ll te J. McIntyre Smith. Ulrich Middeldorf co... VU. M. ART IN FICTION | TWICE-TOLD TALES. BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. VOLUME I. BOSTON: JAMES MUNROE AND COMPANY. MDCCCXLII. Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1837, By Tue AMERICAN Stationers Company, in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. BOSTON: PRINTED BY FREEMAN AND BOLLES, WASHINGTON STREET. . * CONTENTS. VOLUME I. Page. 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Mes sidi nian erorejacos we 221 DPRVRCEIWED, (ance enw s 0's 64000 SEO ea hoy ee ee oe 245 ERR PCE IIO Fac ccs cn sanvssicigneescisdecs 257 ine Hollow of the Three Hills, ....1......ccecsecses 200 PPE OICMUNETER S DAY, cocks css cn cncnanandncnens 279 Timer wemon of the Fountain, ......00ccccceccenvace 291 RM CR erie ty yi oer dees onde decnnees 303 Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment, ....... OE PORE eee 315 7 4 ' Ni t Lege, eae a's ae tw yp ee ewe « i sa bo. Sade e > vi eed ee i ie ee ak * ake Be ke reese se a 4 , 4 ye ait © a ais \ iM pe age aoa wae Sedat Bek Oe LN ORS ass gag “ " ee ae uv ero hy 4 yf wi « , Pir ie mos i ee ah ela 4 cs a iwden Oa a tee! THE GRAY CHAMPION. VOL. I. 1 THE GRAY CHAMPION. THERE was once a time when New England groaned under the actual pressure of heavier wrongs, than those threatened ones which brought on the Revolu- tion. James II., the bigoted successor of Charles the Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colo- nies, and sent a harsh and unprincipled soldier to take away our liberties and endanger our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny: a Governor and Council, holding office from the King, and wholly in- dependent of the country ; laws made and taxes levied without concurrence of the people, immediate or by their representatives; the rights of private citizens violated, and the titles of all landed property declared void ; the voice of complaint stifled by restrictions on the press; and finally, disaffection overawed by the first band of mercenary troops that ever marched on our free soil. For two years our ancestors were kept 4 THE GRAY CHAMPION. in sullen submission, by that filial love which had in- variably secured their allegiance to the mother coun- try, whether its head chanced to be a Parliament, Pro- tector, or popish Monarch. Till these evil times, how- ever, such allegiance had been merely nominal, and the colonists had ruled themselves, enjoying far more freedom, than is even yet the privilege of the native subjects of Great Britain. At length, a rumor reached our shores, that the Prince of Orange had ventured on an enterprise, the ' success of which would be the triumph of civil and religious rights and the salvation of New England. It’ was but a doubtful whisper ; it might be false, or the attempt might fail; and, in either case, the man, that stirred against King James, would lose his head. Still the intelligence produced a marked effect. The peo- ple smiled mysteriously in the streets, and threw bold glances at their oppressors ; while, far and wide, there was a subdued and silent agitation, as if the slightest signal would rouse the whole land from its sluggish despondency. Aware of their danger, the rulers re- solved to avert it by an imposing display of strength and perhaps to confirm their despotism by yet harsher measures. One afternoon in April, 1689, Sir Edmund Andros and his favorite councillors, being warm with wine, assembled the red-coats of the Governor’s Guard, and made their appearance in the streets of Boston. ‘The sun was near setting when the march commenced. The roll of the drum, at that unquiet crisis, seemed to go through the streets, less as the martial music of THE GRAY CHAMPION. 5 the soldiers, than as a muster-call to the inhabitants themselves. A multitude, by various avenues, assem- bled in King-street, which was destined to be the scene, nearly a century afterwards, of another encounter be- tween the troops of Britain, and a people struggling against her tyranny. ‘Though more than sixty years had elapsed, since the Pilgrims came, this crowd of their descendants still showed the strong and sombre features of their character, perhaps more strikingly in such a stern emergency than on happier occasions. There was the sober garb, the general severity of mien, the gloomy but undismayed expression, the scriptural forms of speech, and the confidence in Heaven’s bles- sing on a righteous cause, which would have marked a band of the original Puritans, when threatened by some peril of the wilderness. Indeed, it was not yet time for the old spirit to be extinct ; since there were _ men in the street, that day, who had worshiped there beneath the trees, before a house was reared to the God, for whom they had become exiles. Old soldiers of the Parliament were here too, smiling grimly at the thought, that their aged arms might strike another blow against the house of Stuart. Here also, were the veterans of King Philip’s war, who had burned vil- lages and slaughtered young and old, with pious fierceness, while the godly souls throughout the land were helping them with prayer. Several ministers were scattered among the crowd, which, unlike all other mobs, regarded them with such reverence, as if there were sanctity in their very garments. These holy men exerted their influence to quiet the people, 6 THE GRAY CHAMPION. but not to disperse them. Meantime, the purpose of the Governor, in disturbing the peace of the town, at a period when the slightest commotion might throw the country into a ferment, was almost the universal subject of inquiry, and variously explained. ‘ Satan will strike his master-stroke presently,’ cried some, ‘ because he knoweth that his time is short. All our godly pastors are to be dragged to prison! We shall see them at a Smithfield fire in King-street!’ Hereupon, the people of each parish gathered closer round their minister, who looked calmly upwards and assumed a more apostolic dignity, as well befitted a candidate for the highest honor of his profession, the crown of martyrdom. It was actually fancied, at that period, that New England might have a John Rogers of her own, to take the place of that worthy in the Primer. ‘The Pope of Rome has given orders for a new St. Bartholomew!’ cried others. ‘ We are to be massacred, man and male child!” Neither was this rumor wholly discredited, although the wiser class believed the Governor’s object some- what less atrocious. His predecessor under the old charter, Bradstreet, a venerable companion of the first settlers, was known to be in town. There were grounds for conjecturing, that Sir Edmund Andros intended, at once, to strike terror, by a parade of mil- itary force, and to confound the opposite faction, by possessing himself of their chief. ‘Stand firm for the old charter Governor!’ shouted the crowd, seizing upon the idea. *The good old Governor Bradstreet ! THE GRAY CHAMPION. 7 While this cry was at the loudest, the people were surprised by the well known figure of Governor Brad- street himself, a patriarch of nearly ninety, who ap- peared on the elevated steps of a door, and, with char- acteristic mildness, besought them to submit to the constituted authorities. ‘My children,’ concluded this venerable person, ‘do nothing rashly. Cry not aloud, but pray for the welfare of New England, and expect patiently what the Lord will do in this matter!’ The event was soon to be decided. All this time, the roll of the drum had been approaching through Cornhill, louder and deeper, till with reverberations from house to house, and the regular tramp of martial footsteps, it burst into the street. A double rank of soldiers made their appearance, occupying the whole breadth of the passage, with shouldered matchlocks, and matches burning, so as to present a row of fires in the dusk. Their steady march was like the pro- gress of a machine, that would roll irresistibly over every thing in its way. Next, moving slowly, with a confused clatter of hoofs on the pavement, rode a party of mounted gentlemen, the central figure being Sir Edmund Andros, elderly, but erect and soldier- like. ‘Those around him were his favorite council- lors, and the bitterest foes of New England. At his right hand rode Edward Randolph, our arch enemy, that ‘ blasted wretch,’ as Cotton Mather calls him, who achieved the downfall of our ancient government, and was followed with a sensible curse, through life and to his grave. On the other side was Bullivant, scat- 8 THE GRAY CHAMPION. tering jests and mockery as he rode along. Dudley came behind, with a downcast look, dreading, as well he might, to meet the indignant gaze of the people, who beheld him, their only countryman by birth, among the oppressors of his native land. ‘The cap- tain of a frigate in the harbor, and two or three civil officers under the Crown, were also there. But the figure which most attracted the public eye, and stirred up the deepest feeling, was the Episcopal clergyman of King’s Chapel, riding haughtily among the magis- trates in his priestly vestments, the fitting representa- tive of prelacy and persecution, the union of church and state, and all those abominations which had driven the Puritans to the wilderness. Another guard of soldiers, in double rank, brought up the rear. The whole scene was a picture of the condition of New England, and its moral, the deformity of any government that does not grow out of the nature of things and the character of the people. On one side the religious multitude, with their sad visages and dark attire, and on the other, the group of despotic rulers, with the high churchman in the midst, and here and there a crucifix at their bosoms, all magnifi- cently clad, flushed with wine, proud of unjust au- thority, and scoffing at the universal groan. And the mercenary soldiers, waiting but the word to deluge the street with blood, showed the only means by which obedience could be secured. ‘Oh! Lord of Hosts,’ cried a voice among the crowd, ‘ provide a Champion for thy people!’ This ejaculation was loudly uttered, and served as THE GRAY CHAMPION. 9 a herald’s cry, to introduce a remarkable personage. The crowd had rolled back, and were now huddled together nearly at the extremity of the street, while the soldiers had advanced no more than a third of its length. ‘The intervening space was empty —a paved solitude, between lofty edifices, which threw almost a twilight shadow over it. Suddenly, there was seen the figure of an ancient man, who seemed to have emerged from among the people, and was walking by himself along the centre of the street, to confront the armed band. He wore the old Puritan dress, a dark cloak and a steeple-crowned hat, in the fashion of at least fifty years before, with a heavy sword upon his thigh, but a staff in his hand, to assist the tremulous gait of age. When at some distance from the multitude, the old man turned slowly round, displaying a face of antique majesty, rendered doubly venerable by the hoary beard that descended on his breast. He made a ges- ture at once of encouragement and warning, then turned again, and resumed his way. ‘Who is this gray patriarch?’ asked the young men of their sires. ‘Who is this venerable brother?’ asked the old men among themselves. But none could make reply. The fathers of the people, those of fourscore years and upwards, were disturbed, deeming it strange that they should forget one of such evident authority, whom they must have known in their early days, the associate of Winthrop, and all the old Councillors, giving laws, and making 10 THE GRAY CHAMPION. prayers, and leading them against the savage. The elderly men ought to have remembered him, too, with locks as gray in their youth, as their own were now. And the young! How could he have passed so ut- terly from their memories — that hoary sire, the relic of long-departed times, whose awful benediction had surely been bestowed on their uncovered heads, in childhood ? | _ ¢Whence did he come? What is his purpose ? Who can this old man be?’ whispered the wondering crowd. Meanwhile, the venerable stranger, staff in hand, was pursuing his solitary walk along the centre of the street. As he drew near the advancing soldiers, and as the roll of their drum came full upon his ear, the old man raised himself to a loftier mien, while the de- crepitude of age seemed to fall from his shoulders, leaving him in gray, but unbroken dignity. Now, he marched onward with a warrior’s step, keeping time to the military music. Thus the aged form advanced on one side, and the whole parade of soldiers and magistrates on the other, till, when scarcely twenty yards remained between, the old man grasped his staff by the middle, and held it before him like a leader’s truncheon. ‘Stand !? cried he. The eye, the face, and attitude of command; the solemn, yet warlike peal of that voice, fit either to rule a host in the battle-field or be raised to God in prayer, were irresistible. At the old man’s word and outstretched arm, the roll of the drum was hushed at - THE GRAY CHAMPION. 11 once, and the advancing line stood still. A tremulous enthusiasm seized upon the multitude. That stately form, combining the leader and the saint, so gray, so dimly seen, in such an ancient garb, could only be- long to some old champion of the righteous cause, whom the oppressor’s drum had summoned from his grave. ‘They raised a shout of awe and exultation, and looked for the deliverance of New England. The Governor, and the gentlemen of his party, per- ceiving themselves brought to an unexpected stand, rode hastily forward, as if they would have pressed their snorting and affrighted horses right against the hoary apparition. He, however, blenched not a step, but glancing his severe eye round the group, which half encompassed him, at last bent it sternly on Sir Edmund Andros. One would have thought that the dark old man was chief ruler there, and that the Governor and Council, with soldiers at their back, representing the whole power and authority of the Crown, had no alternative but obedience. ‘What does this old fellow here?’ cried Edward Randolph, fiercely. ‘On, Sir Edmund! Bid the soldiers forward, and give the dotard the same choice that you give all his countrymen — to stand aside or be trampled on!’ ‘Nay, nay, let us show respect to the good grand- sire,’ said Bullivant, laughing, ‘See you not, he is some old round-heaced dignitary, who’ hath lain asleep these thirty years, and knows nothing of the change of times? Doubtless, he thinks to put us down with a proclamation in Old Noll’s name!’ ‘Pa THE GRAY CHAMPION. ‘Are you mad, old man ?” demanded Sir Edmund Andros, in loud and harsh tones. ‘How dare you stay the march of King James’s Governor ?’ ‘IT have staid the march of a King himself, ere now,’ replied the gray figure, with stern composure. ‘T am here, Sir Governor, because the cry of an op- pressed: people hath disturbed me in my secret place ; and beseeching this favor earnestly of the Lord, it was vouchsafed me to appear once again on earth, in the good old cause of his Saints. And what speak ye of James? There is no longer a popish tyrant on the throne of England, and by tomorrow noon, his name shall be a by-word in this very street, where ye would make it a word of terror. Back, thou that wast a Governor, back! With this night thy power is ended — tomorrow, the prison ! — back, lest I fore- tell the scaffold !” The people had been drawing nearer and nearer, and drinking in the words of their champion, who spoke in accents long disused, like one unaccustomed to converse, except with the dead of many years ago. But his voice stirred their souls. ‘They confronted the soldiers, not wholly without arms, and ready to convert the very stones of the street into deadly weapons. Sir Edmund Andros looked at the old man ; then he cast his hard and cruel eye over the multitude, and beheld them burning with that lurid wrath, so difficult to kindle or to quench ; and again he fixed his gaze on the aged form, which stood obscurely in an open space, where neither friend nor foe had thrust himself. What were his thoughts, he uttered no word THE GRAY CHAMPION. 13 which might discover. But whether the oppressor were overawed by the Gray Champion’s look, or per- ceived his peril in the threatening attitude of the peo- ple, it is certain that he gave back, and ordered his soldiers to commence a slow and guarded retreat. Before another sunset, the Governor, and all that rode so proudly with him, were prisoners, and long ere it was known that James had abdicated, King William was proclaimed throughout New England. But where was the Gray Champion? Some re- ported, that when the troops had gone from King- street and the people were thronging tumultuously in their rear, Bradstreet, the aged Governor, was seen to embrace a form more aged than his own. Others soberly affirmed, that while they marveled at the ven- erable grandeur of his aspect, the old man had faded from their eyes, melting slowly into the hues of twi- light, till, where he stood, there was an empty space. But all agreed, that the hoary shape was gone. The men of that generation watched for his re-appearance, in sunshine and in twilight, but never saw him more, nor knew when his funeral passed, nor where his gravestone was. | And who was the Gray Champion? Perhaps his name might be found in the records of that stern Court of Justice, which passed a sentence, too mighty for the age, but glorious in all after times, for its hum- bling lesson to the monarch and its high example to _ the subject. I have heard, that, whenever the de- scendants of the Puritans are to show the spirit of their sires, the old man appears again. Wheneighty 14 THE GRAY CHAMPION. years had passed, he walked once more in King street. Five years later, in the twilight of an April morning, he stood on the green, beside the meeting house, at Lexington, where now the obelisk of granite, with a slab of slate inlaid, commemorates the first fallen of the Revolution. And when our fathers were toiling at the breastwork on Bunker’s Hill, all through that night the old warrior walked his rounds. Long, long may it be, ere he comes again! His hour is one of darkness, and adversity, and peril. But should domestic tyranny oppress us, or the invader’s step pollute our soil, still may the Gray Champion come ; for he is the type of New England’s hereditary spirit: and his shadowy march, on the eve of danger, must ever be the pledge, that New England’s sons will vindicate their ancestry. SUNDAY AT HOME. SUNDAY AT HOME. Every Sabbath morning, in the summer time, J thrust. back the curtain, to watch the sunrise stealing down a steeple, which stands opposite my chamber window. First, the weathercock begins to flash ; then, a fainter lustre gives the spire an airy aspect; next it en- croaches on the tower, and causes the index of the dial to glisten like gold, as it points to the gilded fig- ure of the hour. Now, the loftiest window gleams, and now the lower. The carved frame-work of the portal is marked strongly out. At length, the morn- ing glory, in its descent from Heaven, comes down the stone steps, one by one; and there stands the steeple, glowing with fresh radiance, while the shades of twilight still hide themselves among the nooks of the adjacent buildings. Methinks, though the same sun brightens it, every fair morning, yet the steeple has a peculiar robe of brightness for the Sabbath. By dwelling near a church, a person soon contracts VOL. 1. 2 18 SUNDAY AT HOME. an attachment for the edifice. We naturally per- | sonify it, and conceive its massy walls, and its dim emptiness, to be instinct with a calm, and meditative, and somewhat melancholy spirit. But the steeple stands foremost, in our thoughts, as well as locally. It impresses us as a giant, with a mind comprehen- sive and discriminating enough to care for the great and small concerns of all the town. Hourly, while it speaks a moral to the few that think, it reminds thousands of busy individuals of their separate and most secret affairs. It is the steeple, too, that flings abroad the hurried and irregular accents of general alarm; neither have gladness and festivity found a better utterance, than by its tongue; and when the dead are slowly passing to their home, the steeple has a melancholy voice to bid them welcome. Yet, in spite of this connexion with human interests, what a moral loneliness, on week days, broods round about its stately height! It has no kindred with the houses above which it towers ; it looks down into the narrow thoroughfare, the lonelier, because the crowd are elbowing their passage at its base. A. glance at the body of the church deepens thisimpression. Within, by the light of distant windows, amid refracted shad- ows, we discern the vacant pews and empty galleries, the silent organ, the voiceless pulpit, and the clock, which tells to solitude how time is passing. ‘Time — where man lives not — what is it but eternity ? And in the church, we might suppose, are garnered up, throughout the week, all thoughts and feelings that have reference to eternity, until the holy day comes SUNDAY AT HOME. 19 round again, to let them forth. Might not, then, its more appropriate site be in the outskirts of the town, with space for old trees to wave around it, and throw their solemn shadows over a quiet green? We will say more of this, hereafter. But, on the Sabbath, I watch the earliest sunshine, and fancy that a holier brightness marks the day, when there shall be no buzz of voices on the Ex- change, nor traffic in the shops, nor crowd, nor busi- ness, anywhere but at church. Many have fancied so. For my own part, whether I see it scattered down among tangled woods, or beaming broad across the fields, or hemmed in between brick buildings, or tracing out the figure of the casement on my chamber floor, still I recognise the Sabbath sunshine. And ever let me recognise it! Some illusions, and this among them, are the shadows of great truths. Doubts may flit around me, or seem to close their evil wings, and settle down; but, so long as I imagine that the earth is hallowed, and the light of heaven retains its sanctity, on the Sabbath — while that blessed sunshine lives within me — never can my soul have lost the in- stinct of its faith. If it have gone astray, it will re- turn again. I love to spend such pleasant Sabbaths, from morn- ing till night, behind the curtain of my open window. Are they spent amiss? Every spot, so near the church as to be visited by the circling shadow of the steeple, should be deemed consecrated ground, to-day. With stronger truth be it said, that a devout heart may consecrate a den of thieves, as an evil one may con- 20 SUNDAY AT HOME. vert a temple to the same. My heart, perhaps, has not such holy, nor, I would fain trust, such impious potency. It must suffice, that, though my form be absent, my inner man goes constantly to church, while many, whose bodily presence fills the accustomed seats, have left their souls at home. But I am there, even before my friend, the sexton. At length, he comes —a man of kindly, but sombre aspect, in dark gray clothes, and hair of the same mixture — he comes, and applies his key to the wide portal. Now, my thoughts may go in among the dusty pews, or as- cend the pulpit without sacrilege, but soon come forth again, to enjoy the music of the bell. How glad, yet solemn too! All the steeples in town are talking to- gether, aloft in the sunny air, and rejoicing among them- selves, while their spires point heavenward. Mean- time, here are the children assembling to the Sabbath- school, which is kept somewhere within the church. Often, while looking at the arched portal, I have been gladdened by the sight of a score of these little girls and boys, in pink, blue, yellow, and crimson frocks, bursting suddenly forth into the sunshine, like a swarm of gay butterflies that had been shut up in the solemn gloom. OrlI might compare them to cherubs, haunt- ing that holy place. About a quarter of an hour before the second ring- ing of the bell, individuals of the congregation begin to appear. The earliest is invariably an old woman in black, whose bent frame and rounded shoulders are evidently laden with some heavy affliction, which she is eager to rest upon the altar. Would that the SUNDAY AT HOME. 21 Sabbath came twice as often, for the sake of that sor- rowful old soul! There is an elderly man, also, who arrives in good season, and leans against the corner of the tower, just within the line of its shadow, look- ing downward with a darksome brow. I sometimes fancy that the old woman is the happier of the two. After these, others drop in singly, and by twos and threes, either disappearing through the door-way, or taking their stand in its vicinity. At last, and always with an unexpected sensation, the bell turns in the steeple overhead, and throws out an irregular clangor, jarring the tower to its foundation. As if there were magic in the sound, the sidewalks of the street, both up and down along, are immediately thronged with two long lines of people, all converging hitherward, and streaming into the church. Perhaps the far-off roar of a coach draws nearer —a deeper thunder by its contrast with the surrounding stillness — until it sets down the wealthy worshipers at the portal, among their humblest brethren. Beyond that entrance, in theory at least, there are no distinctions of earthly rank; nor, indeed, by the goodly apparel which is flaunting in the sun, would there seem to be such, on the hither side. Those pretty girls! Why will they disturb my pious meditations! Of all days in the week, they should strive to look least fascinating on the Sabbath, instead of heightening their mortal love- liness, as if to rival the blessed angels, and keep our. thoughts from heaven. Were I the minister himself, I must needs look. One girl is white muslin from the waist upwards, and black silk downwards to her 22 SUNDAY AT HOME. slippers ; a second, blushes from top-knot to shoe-tie, one universal scarlet; another shines of a pervading yellow, as if she had made a garment of the sun- shine. The greater part, however, have adopted a milder cheerfulness of hue. Their veils, especially when the wind raises them, give a lightness to the general effect, and make them appear like airy phan- toms, as they flit up the steps, and vanish into the sombre door-way. Nearly all—though it is very strange that I should know it— wear white stockings, white as snow, and neat slippers, laced crosswise with black ribbon, pretty high above the ankles. A white stocking is infinitely more effective than a black one. Here comes the clergyman, slow and solemn, in se- vere simplicity, needing no black silk gown to denote his office. His aspect claims my reverence, but can- not win my love. Were I to picture Saint Peter, keeping fast the gate of Heaven, and frowning, more stern than pitiful, on the wretched applicants, that face should be my study. By middle age, or sooner, the creed has generally wrought upon the heart, or been attempered by it. As the minister passes into the church, the bell holds its iron tongue, and all the low murmur of the congregation dies away. The gray sexton looks up and down the street, and then at my window curtain, where, through the small peep- hole, I half fancy that he has caught my eye. Now, every loiterer has gone in, and the street lies asleep in the quiet sun, while a feeling of loneliness comes over me, and brings also an uneasy sense of neglected privileges and duties. Oh, I ought to have gone to +’ SUNDAY AT HOME. 23 church! The bustle of the rising congregation reaches my ears. They are standing up to pray. Could I bring my heart into unison with those who are praying in yonder church, and lift it heavenward, with a fervor of supplication, but no distinct request, would not that be the safest kind of prayer? ‘ Lord, look down upon me in mercy!’ With that sentiment gushing from my soul, might I not leave all the rest to Him? Hark! the hymn. This, at least, is a portion of the service which I can enjoy better than if I sat within the walls, where the full choir, and the mas- sive melody of the organ would fall with a weight upon me. At this distance, it thrills through my frame, and plays upon my heart-strings, with a pleas- ure both of the sense and spirit. Heaven be praised, I know nothing of music, as a science ; and the most elaborate harmonies, if they please me, please as simply as anurse’s lullaby. The strain has ceased, but prolongs itself in my mind, with fanciful echoes, till I start from my reverie, and find that the sermon has commenced. It is my misfortune seldom to fructify, in a regular way, by any but printed sermons. The first strong idea, which the preacher utters, gives birth to a train of thought, and leads me onward, step by step, quite out of hearing of the good man’s voice, unless he be indeed a son of thunder. At my open window, catching now and then a sentence of the ‘ parson’s saw,’ I am as well situated as at the foot of the pulpit stairs. The broken and scattered frag- ments of this one discourse will be the texts of many x r 24 SUNDAY AT HOME. sermons, preached by those colleague pastors — col- leagues, but often disputants— my Mind and Heart. The former pretends to be a scholar, and perplexes me with doctrinal points ; the latter takes me on the score of feeling ; and both, like several other preach- ers, spend their strength to very little purpose. 1, their sole auditor, cannot always understand them. Suppose that a few hours have passed, and behold me still behind my curtain, just before the close of the afternoon service. The hour-hand on the dial has passed beyond four o’clock. ‘The declining sun is hidden behind the steeple, and throws its shadow straight across the street, so that my chamber is dark- ened, as with a cloud. Around the church door, all is solitude, and an impenetrable obscurity, beyond the threshold. A commotion is heard. The seats are slammed down, and the pew doors thrown back — a multitude of feet are trampling along the unseen aisles— and the congregation bursts suddenly through the portal. Foremost, scampers a rabble of boys, be- hind whom moves a dense and dark phalanx of grown men, and lastly, a crowd of females, with young children, and a few scattered husbands. ‘This instan- taneous outbreak of life into loneliness is one of the pleasantest scenes of the day. Some of the good _ people are rubbing their eyes, thereby intimating that they have been wrapt, as it, were, in a sort of holy trance, by the fervor of their devotion. There is a young man, a third-rate coxcomb, whose first care is always to flourish a white handkerchief, and brush the seat of a tight pair of black silk pantaloons, which Fa - SUNDAY AT HOME. 25 shine as if varnished. They must have been made of the stuff called ‘everlasting, or perhaps of the same piece as Christian’s garments in the Pilgrim’s Progress, for he put them on two summers ago, and has not yet worn the gloss off. I have taken a great liking to those black silk pantaloons. But, now, with nods and greetings among friends, each matron takes her husband’s arm, and paces gravely home- ward, while the girls also flutter away, after arranging sunset walks with their favored bachelors. The Sab- bath eve is the eve of love. At length, the whole congregation is dispersed. No; here, with faces as glossy as black satin, come two sable ladies and a sa- ble gentleman, and _ close in their rear, the minister, who softens his severe visage, and bestows a kind word on each. Poor souls! To them, the most cap- tivating picture of bliss in Heaven, is —‘'There we shall be white !’ All is solitude again. But, hark!—a broken warbling of voices, and now, attuning its grandeur to their sweetness, a stately peal of the organ. Who are the choristers? Let me dream that the angels, who came down from Heaven, this blessed. morn, to blend themselves with the worship of the truly good, are playing and singing their farewell to the earth. On the wings of that rich melody, they were borne upward. ; This, gentle reader, is merely a flight of poetry. A few of the singing men and singing women had lingered behind their fellows, and raised their voices fitfully, and blew a careless note upon the organ. e - - * hy % 26 SUNDAY AT HOME. Yet, it lifted my soul higher than all their former strains. They are gone —the sons and daughters of music —— and the gray sexton is just closing the por- tal. For six days more, there will be no face of man in the pews, and aisles, and galleries, nor a voice in the pulpit, nor music in the choir. Was it worth while to rear this massive edifice, to be a desert in the heart of the town, and populous only for a few hours of each seventh day ? Oh! but the church is a symbol of religion. May its site, which was consecrated on the day when the first tree was felled, be kept holy for ever, a spot of solitude and peace, amid the trouble and vanity of our week-day world! ‘There is a moral, and a religion too, even in the silent walls. And, may the steeple still point heavenward, and be decked with the hallowed sunshine of the Sabbath morn ! THE WEDDING KNELL. THE WEDDING KNELL. THERE is a certain church in the city of New York, which I have always regarded with peculiar interest, on account of a marriage there solemnized, under very singular circumstances, in my grandmother’s girlhood. That venerable lady chanced to be a spec- tator of the scene, and ever after made it her favorite narrative. Whether the edifice now standing on the same site be the identical one to which she referred, I am not antiquarian enough to know ; nor would it be worth while to correct myself, perhaps, of an agree- able error, by reading the date of its erection on the tablet over the door. It is a stately church, surround- ed by an inclosure of the loveliest green, within which appear urns, pillars, obelisks, and other forms of mon- umental marble, the tributes of private affection, or more splendid memorials of historic dust. With such a place, though the tumult of the city rolls beneath 30 THE WEDDING KNELL. its tower, one would be willing to connect some le- gendary interest. The marriage might be considered as the result of an early engagement, though there had been two in- termediate weddings on the lady’s part, and forty years of celibacy on that of the gentleman. At sixty- five, Mr. Ellenwood was a shy, but not quite a se- cluded man; selfish, like all men who brood over their own hearts, yet manifesting, on rare occasions, a vein of generous sentiment; a scholar, throughout life, though always an indolent one, because his studies had no definite object, either of public advantage or personal ambition ; a gentleman, high-bred and fas- tidiously delicate, yet sometimes requiring a consid- erable relaxation, in his behalf, of the common rules of society. In truth, there were so many anomalies in his character, and though shrinking with diseased sensibility from public notice, it had been his fatality so often to become the topie of the day, by some wild eccentricity of conduct, that people searched his lineage for an hereditary taint of insanity. But there was no need of this. His caprices had their origin in a mind that lacked the support of an engrossing purpose, and in feelings that preyed upon themselves, for want of other food. If he were mad, it was the consequence, and not the cause, of an aimless and abortive life. | The widow was as complete a contrast to her third bridegroom, in every thing but age, as can well be conceived. Compelled to relinquish her first engage- ment, she had been united to a man of twice her own THE WEDDING KNELL. ol years, to whom she became an exemplary wife, and by whose death she was left in possession of a splen- did fortune. A southern gentleman considerably younger than herself, succeeded to her hand, and carried her to Charleston, where, after many uncom- fortable years, she found herself again a widow. It would have been singular, if any uncommon delicacy of feeling had survived through such a life as Mrs. Dabney’s ; it could not but be crushed and killed by her early disappointment, the cold duty of her first marriage, the dislocation of: the heart’s_ principles, consequent on a second union, and the unkindness of her southern husband, which had inevitably driven her to connect the idea of his death with that of her comfort. To be brief, she was that wisest, but un- loveliest variety of woman, a philosopher, bearing troubles of the heart with equanimity, dispensing with all that should have been her happiness, and making the best of what remained. Sage in most matters, the widow was perhaps the more amiable, for the one frailty that made her ridiculous. Being childless, she could not remain beautiful by proxy, in the person of a daughter; she therefore refused to grow old and ugly, on any consideration ; she struggled with Time, and held fast her roses in spite of him, till the ven- erable thief appeared to have relinquished the spoil, as not worth the trouble of acquiring it. The approaching marriage of this woman of the world, with such an unworldly man as Mr. Ellen- wood, was announced soon after Mrs. Dabney’s return io her native city. Superficial observers, and deeper a2 THE WEDDING KNELL. ones, seemed to concur, in supposing that the lady must have borne no inactive part, in arranging the affair; there were considerations of expediency, which she would be far more likely to appreciate than Mr. Ellenwood ; and there was just-the specious phantom of sentiment and romance, in this late union of two early lovers, which sometimes makes a fool of a woman, who has lost her true feelings among the accidents of life. All the wonder was, how the gentleman, with his lack of worldly wisdom, and agonizing consciousness of ridicule, could have been induced to take a measure, at once so prudent and so laughable. But while people talked, the wedding day arrived. The ceremony was to be solemnized according to the Episcopalian forms, and in open church, with a degree of publicity that attracted many spectators, who occupied the front seats of the galleries, and the pews near the altar and along the broad aisle. It had been arranged, or possibly it was the custom of the day, that the parties should proceed separately to church. By some accident, the bride- groom was a little less punctual than the widow and her bridal attendants ; with whose arrival, after this tedious, but necessary preface, the action of our tale may be said to commence. The clumsy wheels of several old fashioned coaches were heard, and the gentlemen and ladies, composing the bridal party, came through the church door, with the sudden and gladsome effect of a burst of sunshine. The whole group, except the principal figure, was made up of youth and gaiety. As they streamed up THE WEDDING KNELL. 30 the broad aisle; while the pews and pillars seemed to brighten on either side, their steps were as buoyant as if they mistook the church for a ball-room, and were ready to dance hand in hand to the altar. So brilliant was the spectacle, that few took notice of a singular phenomenon that had marked its entrance. At the moment when the bride’s foot touched the threshold, the bell swung heavily in the tower above her, and sent forth its deepest knell. The vibrations died away and returned, with prolonged solemnity, as she entered the body of the church. ‘Good heavens! what an omen,’ whispered a young lady to her lover. ‘Qn my honor,’ replied the gentleman, ‘I believe the bell has the good taste to toll of its own accord. What has she to do with weddings? If you, dearest Julia, were approaching the altar, the bell would ring out its merriest peal. It has only a funeral knell for her.’ The bride, and most of her company, had been too much occupied with the bustle of entrance, to hear the first boding stroke of the bell, or at least to reflect on the singularity of such a welcome to the altar. They therefore continued to advance, with undimin- ished gaiety. The gorgeous dresses of the time, the crimson velvet coats, the gold-laced hats, the hoop- petticoats, the silk, satin, brocade and embroidery, the buckles, canes and swords, all displayed to the best advantage on persons suited to such finery, made the group appear more like a bright colored picture, ‘than any thing real. But by what perversity of taste, VOL. I. 3 34. THE WEDDING KNELL. had the artist represented his principal figure as so wrinkled and decayed, while yet he had decked her out in the brightest splendor of attire, as if the love- liest maiden had suddenly withered into age, and be- come a moral to the beautiful around her! On they went, however, and had glittered along about a third of the aisle, when another stroke of the bell seemed to fill the church with a visible gloom, dimming and obscuring the bright pageant, till it shone forth again as from a mist. This time the party wavered, stopt, and huddled closer together, while a slight scream was heard from some of the ladies, and a confused whispering among the gentlemen. Thus tossing to and fro, they might have been fancifully compared to a splendid bunch of flowers, suddenly shaken by a puff of wind, which threatened to scatter the leaves of an old, brown, withered rose, on the same stalk with two dewy buds ; such being the emblem of the widow between her fair young bridemaids. But her heroism was admi- rable. She had started with an irrepressible shudder, as if the stroke of the bell had fallen directly on her heart ; then, recovering herself, while her attendants were yet in dismay, she took the lead, and paced calmly up the aisle. The bell continued to swing, strike, and vibrate, with the same doleful regularity, as when a corpse is on its way to the tomb. ‘My young friends here have their nerves a little shaken,’ said the widow, with a smile, to the clergy- man at the altar. ‘ But somany weddings have been ushered in with the merriest peal of the bells, and yet THE WEDDING KNELL. 30D turned out unhappily, that I shall hope for better for- tune under such different auspices.’ ‘ Madam,’ answered the rector, in great perplexity, ‘this strange occurrence brings to my mind a mar- riage sermon of the famous Bishop Taylor, wherein he mingles so many thoughts of mortality and future woe, that, to speak somewhat after his own rich style, he seems to hang the bridal chamber in black, and cut the wedding garment out of a coffin pall. And it has been the custom of divers nations to infuse something of sadness into their marriage ceremonies ; so to keep death in mind, while contracting that en- gagement which is life’s chiefest business. ‘Thus we may draw a sad but profitable moral from this funeral knell.’ | But, though the clergyman might have given his moral even a keener point, he did not fail to despatch an attendant to inquire into the mystery, and stop those sounds, so dismally appropriate to such a mar- riage. A brief space elapsed, during which, the silence was broken only by whispers, and a few sup- pressed titterings, among the wedding party and the spectators, who, after the first shock, were disposed to draw an ill-natured merriment from the affair. The young have less charity for aged follies, than the old for those of youth. The widow’s glance was observed to wander, for an instant, towards a window of the church, as if searching for the time-worn mar- ble that she had dedicated to her first husband; then her eyelids dropt over their faded orbs, and her thoughts were drawn irresistibly to another grave. 36 THE WEDDING KNELL. Two buried men, with a voice at her ear, and a cry afar off, were calling her to lie down beside them. Perhaps, with momentary truth of feeling, she thought how. much happier had been her fate, if, after years of bliss, the bell were now tolling for her funeral, and she were followed to the grave by the old affec- tion of her earliest lover, long her husband. But why had she returned to him, when their cold hearts shrank from each other’s embrace ? Still the death-bell tolled so mournfully, that the sunshine seemed to fade in the air. A whisper, com- municated from those who stood nearest the windows, now spread through the church; a hearse, with a train of several coaches, was creeping along the street, conveying some dead man to the church-yard, while the bride awaited a living one at the altar. Immedi- ately after, the footsteps of the bridegroom and his friends were heard at the door. The widow looked down the aisle, and clenched the arm of one of her bridemaids in her bony hand, with such unconscious violence, that the fair girl trembled. ‘You frighten me, my dear madam!” cried she. ‘For heaven’s.sake, what is the matter ? ’ ‘Nothing, my dear, nothing,’ said the widow ; then, whispering close to her ear,—‘ There is a foolish fancy, that I cannot get rid of. I am expecting my bridegroom to come into the church, with my two - first husbands for groomsmen! ’ ‘Look, look!’ screamed the bridemaid. ‘ What is here? The funeral!’ As she spoke, a dark procession paced into the THE WEDDING KNELL. 37 church. First came an old man and woman, like chief mourners at a funeral, attired from head to foot in the deepest black, all but their pale features and hoary hair; he leaning on a staff, and supporting her decrepit form with his nerveless arm. Behind, ap- peared another, and another pair, as aged, as black; and mournful as the first. As they drew near, the widow recognised in every face some trait of former friends, long forgotten, but now returning, as if from their old graves, to warn her to prepare a shroud ; or, with purpose almost as unwelcome, to exhibit their wrinkles and infirmity, and claim her as their com- panion by the tokens of her own decay. Many a merry night had she danced with them, in youth. And now, in joyless age, she felt that some withered partner should request her hand, and all unite, ina dance of death, to the music of the funeral bell. While these aged mourners were passing up the aisle, it was observed, that, from pew to pew, the spectators shuddered with irrepressible awe, as some object, hitherto concealed by the intervening figures, came full in sight. Many turned away their faces; others kept a fixed and rigid stare; and a young girl giggled hysterically, and fainted with the laughter on her lips. When the spectral procession approached the altar, each couple separated, and slowly diverged, till, in the centre, appeared a form, that had been worthily ushered in with all this gloomy pomp, the death-knell, and the funeral. It was the bridegroom in his shroud! No garb but that of the grave could have befitted 38 THE WEDDING KNELL. such a death-like aspect; the eyes, indeed, had the wild gleam of a sepulchral lamp; all else was fixed in the stern calmness which old men wear in the coffin. The corpse stood motionless, but addressed the widow in accents that seemed to melt into the clang of the bell, which fell heavily on the air while he spoke. ‘Come, my bride!’ said those pale lips, ‘The hearse is ready. ‘The sexton stands waiting for us at the door of the tomb. Let us be married; and then to our coffins !’ How shall the widow’s horror be represented! It gave her the ghastliness of a dead man’s bride. Her youthful friends stood apart, shuddering at the mourn- ers, the shrouded bridegroom, and herself; the whole scene expressed, by the strongest imagery, the vain struggle of the gilded vanities of this world, when opposed to age, infirmity, sorrow, and death. The awe-struck silence was first broken by the clergyman. ‘Mr. Ellenwood,’ said he, soothingly, yet with somewhat of authority, ‘you are not well. Your mind has been agitated by the unusual circumstances in which you are placed. The ceremony must be deferred. As an old friend, let me entreat you to return home.’ $e. ‘Home! yes; but not without my bride,’ answered he, in the same hollow accents. ‘You deem this mockery; perhaps madness. Had I bedizened my aged and broken frame with scarlet and embroidery — had I forced my withered lips to smile at my dead heart —that might have been mockery, or madness. THE WEDDING KNELL. 39 But now, let young and old declare, which of us has come hither without a wedding garment, the bride- groom, or the bride!’ He stept forward at a ghostly pace, and stood be- side the widow, contrasting the awful simplicity of his shroud with the glare and glitter in which she had arrayed herself for this unhappy scene. None, that beheld them, could deny the terrible strength of the moral which his disordered intellect had contrived to draw. ‘Cruel! cruel!’ groaned the heart-stricken bride. ‘Cruel?’ repeated he; then losing his death-like composure in a wild bitterness, — ‘Heaven judge, which of us has been cruel to the other! In youth, you deprived me of my happiness, my hopes, my aims; you took away all the substance of my life, and made it a dream, without reality enough even to grieve at—with only a pervading gloom, through which I walked wearily, and cared not whither. But after forty years, when I have built my tomb, and would not give up the thought of resting there — no, not for such a life as we once pictured — you call me to the altar. At your summons I am here. But other husbands have enjoyed your youth, your beauty, your warmth of heart, and all that could be termed your life. What is there for me but your decay and death? And therefore I have bidden these funeral friends, and bespoken the sexton’s deepest knell, and am come, in my shroud, to wed you, as with a burial service, that we may join our hands at the door of the sepulchre, and enter it together.’ 40 THE WEDDING KNELL. It was not frenzy ; it was not merely the drunken- ness of strong emotion, in a heart unused to it, that now wrought upon the bride. The stern lesson of the day had done its work ; her worldliness was gone. She seized the bridegroom’s hand. ‘Yes!’ cried she. ‘ Let us wed, even at the door of the sepulchre! My life is gone in vanity and emp- tiness. But at its close, there is one true feeling. It has made me what I was in youth; it makes me worthy of you. Time is no more for both of us. Let us wed for eternity!’ With a long and deep regard, the bridegroom look- ed into her eyes, while a tear was gathering in his own. How strange that gush of human feeling from the frozen bosom of a corpse! He wiped away the tear, even with his shroud. ‘Beloved of my youth,’ said he, ‘I have been wild. The despair of my whole lifetime had returned at once, and maddened me. Forgive ; and be forgiven. Yes; itis evening with us now ; and we have realized none of our morning dreams of happiness. But let us join our hands before the altar, as lovers, whom adverse circumstances have separated through life, yet who meet again as they are leaving it, and find their earthly affection changed into something holy as religion. And what is Time, to the married of Eternity ?’ Amid the tears of many, and a swell of exalted sentiment, in those who felt aright, was solemnized the union of two immortal souls. The train of with- ered mourners, the hoary bridegroom: in his shroud, THE WEDDING KNELL. 4l the pale features of the aged bride, and the death- bell tolling through the whole, till its deep voice over- powered the marriage words, all marked the funeral of earthly hopes. But as the ceremony proceeded, the organ, as if stirred by the sympathies of this im- pressive scene, poured forth an anthem, first mingling with the dismal knell, then rising to a loftier strain, till the soul looked down upon its woe. And when the awful rite was finished, and with cold hand in cold hand, the Married of Eternity withdrew, the or- gan’s peal of solemn triumph drowned the Wedding Knell. Did le ih Swe -F THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. * wet? y ae co 4 tee THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 2 x PARABUE.* THE sexton stood in the porch of Milford meeting- house, pulling lustily at the bell-rope. The old peo- ple of the village came stooping along the street. Children, with bright faces, tript merrily beside their parents, or mimicked a graver gait, in the conscious dignity of their Sunday clothes. Spruce bachelors looked sidelong at the pretty maidens, and fancied that the Sabbath sunshine made them prettier than on week-days. When the throng had mostly streamed into the porch, the sexton began to toll the bell, keep- 1 Another clergyman in New England, Mr. Joseph Moody, of York, Maine, who died about eighty years since, made himself remarkable by the same eccentricity that is here re- lated of the Reverend Mr. Hooper. In his case, however, the symbol had a different import. In early life he had acci- dentally killed a beloved friend; and from that day till the hour of his own death, he hid his face from men. 46 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. ing his eye on the Reverend Mr. Hooper’s door. The first glimpse of the clergyman’s figure, was the signal for the bell to cease its summons. ‘But what has good Parson Hooper got upon his face ?’ cried the sexton in astonishment. All within hearing immediately turned about, and beheld the semblance of Mr. Hooper, pacing slowly his meditative way towards the meeting-house. With one accord they started, expressing more wonder than if some strange minister were coming to dust the cushions of Mr. Hooper’s pulpit. ‘Are you sure it is our parson?’ inquired Good- man Gray of the sexton. ‘Of a certainty it is good Mr. Hooper,’ replied the sexton. ‘He was to have exchanged pulpits with Parson Shute, of Westbury ; but Parson Shute sent to excuse himself yesterday, being to preach a funeral sermon.’ The cause of so much amazement may appear sufficiently slight. Mr. Hooper, a gentlemanly per- son, of about thirty, though still a bachelor, was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a careful wife had starched his band, and brushed the weekly dust from his Sunday’s garb. There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance. Swathed about his forehead, and hanging down over his face, so low as to be shaken by his breath, Mr. Hooper had on a black veil. Ona nearer view, it seemed to consist of two folds of crape, which entirely concealed his features, except the mouth and chin, but probably did not intercept his sight, farther than to give a dark- THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 47 ened aspect to all living and inanimate things. With this gloomy shade before him, good Mr. Hooper walked onward, at a slow and quiet pace, stooping somewhat and looking on the ground, as is custom- ary with abstracted men, yet nodding kindly to those of his parishioners who still waited on the meeting- house steps. But so wonder-struck were they, that his greeting hardly met with a return. ‘I can’t really feel as if good Mr. Hooper’s face was behind that piece, of crape,’ said the sexton. ‘I don’t like it,’ muttered an old woman, as she hobbled into the meeting-house. ‘He has changed himself into something awful, only by hiding his face.’ ‘Our parson has gone mad!’ cried Goodman Gray, following him across the threshold. A rumor of some unaccountable phenomenon had preceded Mr. Hooper into the meeting-house, and set all the congregation astir. Few could refrain from twisting their heads towards the door; many stood upright, and turned directly about; while several lit- tle boys clambered upon the seats, and came down again with a terrible racket.. There was a general bustle, a rustling of the women’s gowns and shuffling of the men’s feet, greatly at variance with that hush- ed repose which should attend the entrance of the minister. But Mr. Hooper appeared not to notice the perturbation of his people. He entered with an al- most noiseless step, bent his head mildly to the pews on each side, and bowed as he passed his oldest parishioner, a white-haired great-grandsire, who oc- 48 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. cupied an arm-chair in the centre of the aisle. It was strange to observe, how slowly this venerable man became conscious of something singular in the appearance of his pastor. He seemed not fully to partake of the prevailing wonder, till Mr. Hooper had ascended the stairs, and showed himself in the pulpit, face to face with his congregation, except for the black veil. That mysterious emblem was never once withdrawn. It shook with his measured breath as he gave out the psalm; it threw its obscurity be- tween him and the holy page, as he read the Scrip- tures; and while he prayed, the veil lay heavily on his uplifted countenance. Did he seek to hide it from the dread Being whom he was addressing ? Such was the effect of this simple piece of crape, that more than one woman of delicate nerves was forced to leave the meeting-house. Yet perhaps the pale-faced congregation was almost as fearful a sight to the minister, as his black veil to them. Mr. Hooper had the reputation of a good preacher, but not an energetic one: he strove to win his people heavenward, by mild, persuasive influences, rather than to drive them thither, by the thunders of the Word. The sermon which he now delivered, was marked by the same characteristics of style and man- ner, as the general series of his pulpit oratory. But there was something, either in the sentiment of the discourse itself, or in the imagination of the auditors, which made it greatly the most powerful effort that they had ever heard from their pastor’s lips. It was tinged, rather more darkly than usual, with the gentle THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 49 gloom of Mr. Hooper’s temperament. The subject had reference to secret sin, and those sad mysteries which we hide from our nearest and dearest, and would fain conceal from our own consciousness, even forgetting that the Omniscient can detect them. A subtle power was breathed into his words. Each member of the congregation, the most innocent girl, and the man of hardened breast, felt as if the preacher had crept upon them, behind his awful veil, and dis- covered their hoarded iniquity of deed or thought. Many spread their clasped hands on their bosoms. There was nothing terrible in what Mr. Hooper said ; at least, no violence; and yet, with every tremor of his melancholy voice, the hearers quaked. An un- sought pathos came hand in hand with awe. So sensible were the audience of some unwonted attri- bute in their minister, that they longed for a breath of wind to blow aside the veil, almost believing that a stranger’s visage would be discovered, though the form, gesture, and voice were those of Mr. Hooper. At the close of the services, the people hurried out with indecorous confusion, eager to communicate their pent-up amazement, and conscious of lighter spirits, the moment they lost sight of the black veil. Some gathered in little circles, huddled closely together, with their mouths all whispering in the centre ; some went homeward alone, wrapt in silent meditation ; some talked loudly, and profaned the Sabbath-day with ostentatious laughter. A few shook their sa- gacious heads, intimating that they could penetrate the mystery; while one or two affirmed that there VOL. I. 4 50 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. was no mystery at all, but only that Mr. Hooper’s eyes were so weakened by the midnight lamp, as to require a shade. After a brief interval, forth came good Mr. Hooper also, in the rear of his flock. Turn- ing his veiled face from one group to another, he paid due reverence to the hoary heads, saluted the middle- aged, with kind dignity, as their friend and spiritual guide, greeted the young with mingled authority and love, and laid his hands on the little children’s heads to bless them. Such was always his custom on the Sabbath-day. Strange and bewildered looks repaid him for his courtesy. None, as on former occasions, aspired to the honor of walking by their pastor’s side. Old Squire Saunders, doubtless by an accidental lapse of memory, neglected to invite Mr. Hooper to his ta- ble, where the good clergyman had been wont to bless the food, almost every Sunday since his: settle- ment. He returned, therefore, to the parsonage, and, at the moment of closing the door, was observed to look back upon the people, all of whom had their eyes fixed upon the minister. A sad smile gleamed faintly from beneath the black veil, and flickered about his mouth, glimmering as he disappeared. ‘How strange,’ said a lady, ‘that a simple black veil, such as any woman might wear on her bonnet, should become such a terrible thing on Mr. Hooper’s face !’ ‘Something must surely be amiss with Mr. Hooper’s intellects,’ observed her husband, the physician of the village. ‘But the strangest part of the affair is the effect of this vagary, even on a sober-minded man - THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 51 like myself. ‘The black veil, though it covers only our pastor’s face, throws its influence over his whole person, and makes him ghost-like from head to foot. Do you not feel it so?’ ‘Truly do I,’ replied the lady ; “and I would not be alone with him for the world, I wonder he is not afraid to be alone with himself!’ ‘Men sometimes are so,’ said her husband. The afternoon service was attended with similar cir- cumstances. At its conclusion, the bell tolled for the fu- neral of a young lady. The relatives and friends were assembled in the house, and the more distant acquaint- ances stood about the door, speaking of the good qual- ities of the deceased, when their talk was interrupted by the appearance of Mr. Hooper, still covered with his black veil. It was now an appropriate emblem. The clergyman stepped into the room where the corpse was laid, and bent over the coffin, to take a last farewell of his deceased parishioner. As he stooped, the veil hung straight down from his forehead, so that, if her eye-lids had not been closed forever, the dead maiden might have seen his face. Could Mr. Hooper be fearful of her glance, that he so hastily caught back the black veil? A person, who watched the inter- view between the dead and living, scrupled not to af- firm, that, at the instant when the clergyman’s fea- tures were disclosed, the corpse had slightly shudder- ed, rustling the shroud and muslin cap, though the countenance retained the composure of death. A superstitious old woman was the only witness of this prodigy. From the coffin, Mr. Hooper passed into 52 THE: MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. the chamber of the mourners, and thence to the head of the staircase, to make the funeral prayer. It was a tender and heart-dissolving prayer, full of sorrow, yet so imbued with celestial hopes, that the music of a heavenly harp, swept by the fingers of the dead, seemed faintly to be heard among the saddest accents of the minister. The people trembled, though they but darkly understood him, when he prayed that they, and himself, and all of mortal race, might be ready, as he trusted this young maiden had been, for the dreadful hour that should snatch the veil from their faces. The bearers went heavily forth, and the mourners followed, saddening all the street, with the dead before them, and Mr. Hooper in his black veil behind. ‘Why do you look. back ?” said one in the proces- sion to his partner. ‘Thad a fancy,’ replied she, ‘ that the minister and the maiden’s spirit were walking hand in hand.’ ‘ And so had I, at the same moment,’ said the other. That night, the handsomest couple in Milford vil- lage were to be joined in wedlock. Though reckoned a melancholy man, Mr. Hooper had a placid cheer- fulness for such occasions, which often excited a sym- pathetic smile, where liyelier merriment would have been thrown away. There was no quality of his dis- position which made him more beloved than this. The company at the wedding awaited his arrival with impatience, trusting that the strange awe, which had gathered over him throughout the day, would now be dispelled. But such was not the result. When Mr. THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 53 Hooper came, the first thing that their eyes rested on was the same horrible black veil, which had added deeper gloom to the funeral, and could portend nothing but evil to the wedding. Such was its im- mediate effect on the guests, that a cloud seemed to have rolled duskily from beneath the black crape, and dimmed the light of the candles. The bridal pair stood up before the minister. But the bride’s cold fingers quivered in the tremulous hand of the bride- groom, and her death-like paleness caused a whisper, that the maiden who had been buried a few hours be- fore, was come from her grave to be married. If ever another wedding were so dismal, it was that famous one, where they tolled the wedding knell. After performing the ceremony, Mr. Hooper raised a glass of wine to his lips, wishing happiness to the new-married couple, in a strain of mild pleasantry that ought to have brightened the features of the guests, like a cheerful gleam from the hearth. At that instant, catching a glimpse of his figure in the looking-glass, the black veil involved his own spirit in the horror with which it overwhelmed all others. His frame shuddered — his lips grew white — he spilt the untasted wine upon the carpet — and rushed forth into the darkness. For the Earth, too, had on her Black Veil. The next day, the whole village of Milford talked of little else than Parson Hooper’s black veil. ‘That, and the mystery concealed behind it, supplied a topic for discussion between acquaintances meeting in the street, and good women gossiping at their open win- 54 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. dows. It was the first item of news that the tavern- keeper told to his guests. The children babbled of it on their way to school. One imitative little imp covered his face with an old black handkerchief, thereby so affrighting his playmates, that the panic seized himself, and he well nigh lost his wits by his own waggery. It was remarkable that, of all the busy-bodies sid impertinent people in the parish, not one ventured to put the plain question to Mr. Hooper, wherefore he did this thing. Hitherto, whenever there appeared the slightest call for such interference, he had never lacked advisers, nor shown himself averse to be guided by their judgment. If he erred at all, it was by so painful a degree of self-distrust, that even the mildest censure would lead him to consider an indif- ferent action as a crime. Yet, though so well ac- quainted with this amiable weakness, no individual among his parishioners chose to make the black veil a subject of friendly remonstrance. There was a feeling of dread, neither plainly confessed nor care- fully concealed, which caused each to shift the re- sponsibility upon another, till at length it was found expedient to send a deputation of the church, in order to deal with Mr. Hooper about the mystery, before it should grow into a scandal. Never did an embassy so ill discharge its duties. The minister received them with friendly courtesy, but became silent, after they were seated, leaving to his visiters the whole burthen of introducing their important business. ‘The topic, it might be supposed, was obvious enough. THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 55 There was the black veil, swathed round Mr. Hooper’s forehead, and concealing every feature above his placid mouth, on which, at times, they could perceive the. glimmering of a melancholy smile. But that piece of crape, to their imagination, seemed to hang down before his heart, the symbol of a fearful secret between him and them. Were the veil but cast aside, they might speak freely of it, but not till then. Thus they sat a considerable time, speechless, confused, and shrinking uneasily from Mr. Hooper’s eye, which they felt to be fixed upon them with an invisible glance. Finally, the deputies returned abashed to their constituents, pronouncing the matter too weighty to be handled, except by a council of the churches, if, indeed, it might not require a general synod. But there was one person in the village, unappalled by the awe with which the black veil had impressed all beside herself. When the deputies returned with- out an explanation, or even venturing to demand one, she, with the calm energy of her character, deter- mined to chase away the strange cloud that appeared to be settling round Mr. Hooper, every moment more darkly than before. As his plighted wife, it should be her privilege to know what the black veil con- cealed, At the minister’s first visit, therefore, she entered upon the subject, with a direct simplicity, which made the task easier both for him and her. After he had seated himself, she fixed her eyes stead- fastly upon the veil, but could discern nothing of the dreadful gloom that had so overawed the multitude: it was but a double fold of crape, hanging down from 56 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. his forehead to his mouth, and slightly stirring with his breath. ‘No,’ said she aloud, and smiling, ‘ there is nothing terrible in this piece of crape, except that it hides a face which I am always glad to look upon. Come, good sir, let the sun shine from behind the cloud. First lay aside your black veil: then tell me why you put it on.’ Mr. Hooper’s smile glimmered faintly. ‘ There is an hour to come,’ said he, ‘ when all of us shall cast aside our veils. Take it not amiss, be- loved friend, if I wear this piece of crape till then.’ ‘Your words are a mystery too,’ returned the young lady. ‘Take away the veil from them, at least.’ ‘ Elizabeth, I will,’ said he, ‘so far as my vow may suffer me. Know, then, this veil is a type and a symbol, and I am bound to wear it ever, both in light and darkness, in solitude and before the gaze of mul- titudes, and as with strangers, so with my familiar friends. No mortal eye will see it withdrawn. This dismal shade must separate me from the world: even you, Elizabeth, can never come behind it!” ‘ What grievous affliction hath befallen you,’ she earnestly inquired, ‘ that you should thus darken your eyes for ever?” ‘If it be a sign of mourning,’ ‘replied Mr. Hooper, ‘T, perhaps, like most other mortals, have sorrows dark enough to be typified by a black veil.’ ‘But what if the world will not believe that it is the type of an innocent sorrow?’ urged Elizabeth. THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 57 ‘Beloved and respected as you are, there may be whispers, that you hide your face under the conscious- ness of secret sin. For the sake of your holy oflice, do away this scandal !” The color rose into her cheeks, as she intimated the nature of the rumors that were already abroad in the village. But Mr. Hooper’s mildness did not for- sake him. He even smiled again — that same sad smile, which always appeared like a faint glimmering of light, proceeding from the obscurity beneath the veil. ‘If I hide my face for sorrow, there is cause enough,’ he merely replied ; ‘and if 1 cover it for secret sin, what mortal might not do the same ? ’ . And with this gentle, but unconquerable obstinacy, did he resist all her entreaties. At length Elizabeth sat silent. For a few moments she appeared lost in thought, considering, probably, what new methods might be tried, to withdraw her lover from so dark a fantasy, which, if it had no other meaning, was per- haps a symptom of mental disease. Though of a firmer character than his own, the tears rolled down her cheeks. But, in an instant, as it were, a new feeling took the place of sorrow: her eyes were fixed insensibly on the black veil, when, like a sudden twi- light in the air, its terrors fell around her. She arose, and stood trembling before him. ‘ And do you feel it then at last?’ said he mourn- fully. She made no reply, but covered her eyes with her hand, and turned to leave the room. He rushed for- ward and caught her arm. 58 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. ‘Have patience with me, Elizabeth!’ cried he passionately. ‘Do not desert me, though this veil must be between us here on earth. Be mine, and hereafter there shall be no veil over my face, no darkness between our souls! It is but a mortal veil —it is not for eternity! Oh! you know not how lonely I am, and how frightened, to be alone behind my black veil. Do not leave me in this miserable obscurity for ever!’ ‘ Lift the veil but once, and look me in the face,’ said she. 7 ‘Never! It cannot be!’ replied Mr. Hooper. ‘Then, farewell!’ said Elizabeth. She withdrew her arm from his grasp, and slowly departed, pausing at the door, to give one long, shud- dering gaze, that seemed almost to penetrate the mystery of the black veil. But, even amid his grief, Mr. Hooper smiled to think that only a material em- blem had separated him from happiness, though the horrors, which it shadowed forth, must be drawn dark- ly between the fondest of lovers. From that time no attempts were made to remove Mr. Hooper’s black veil, or, by a direct appeal, to dis- cover the secret which it was supposed to hide. By persons who claimed a superiority to popular preju- dice, it was reckoned merely an eccentric whim, such as often mingles with the sober actions of men other- wise rational, and tinges them all with its own sem- blance of insanity. But with the multitude, good Mr. Hooper was irreparably a bugbear. He could not walk the street with any peace of mind, so conscious THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 59 was he that the gentle and timid would turn aside to avoid him, and that others would make it a point of hardihood to throw themselves in his way. The im- pertinence of the latter class compelled him to give up his customary walk, at sunset, to the burial ground ; for when he leaned pensively over the gate, there would always be faces behind the grave-stones, peep- ing at his black veil. A fable went the rounds, that the stare of the dead people drove him thence. It grieved him, to the very depth of his kind heart, to observe how the children fled from his approach, breaking up their merriest sports, while his melancholy figure was yet afar off. Their instinctive dread caused him to feel, more strongly than aught else, that a preternatural horror was interwoven with the threads of the black crape. In truth, his own antipathy to the veil was known to be so great, that he never will- ingly passed before a mirror, nor stooped to drink at a still fountain, lest, in its peaceful bosom, he should be affrighted by himself. This was what gave plausi- bility to the whispers, that Mr. Hooper’s conscience tortured him for some great crime too horrible to be entirely concealed, or otherwise than so obscurely in- timated. Thus, from beneath the black veil, there rolled a cloud into the sunshine, an ambiguity of sin or sorrow, which enveloped the poor minister, so that love or sympathy could never reach him. It was said, that ghost and fiend consorted with him there. With self-shudderings and outward terrors, he walked con- tinually in its shadow, groping darkly within his own soul, or gazing through a medium that saddened the 60 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. whole world. Even the lawless wind, it was believed, respected his dreadful secret, and never blew aside the veil. But still good Mr. Hooper sadly smiled, at the pale visages of the worldly throng as he passed by. Among all its bad influences, the black veil had the one desirable effect, of making its wearer a very efficient clergyman. By the aid of his mysterious em- blem — for there was no other apparent cause — he became a man of awful power, over souls that were in agony for sin. His converts always regarded him with a dread peculiar to themselves, affirming, though but figuratively, that, before he brought them to celes- tial light, they had been with him behind the black veil. Its gloom, indeed, enabled him to sympathize with all dark affections. Dying sinners cried aloud for Mr. Hooper, and would not yield their breath til he appeared; though ever, as he stooped to whisper consolation, they shuddered at the veiled face so near their own. Such were the terrors of the black veil, even when Death had bared his visage! Strangers came long distances to attend service at his church, ~ with the mere idle purpose of gazing at his figure, because it was forbidden them to behold his face. But many were made to quake ere they departed ! Once, during Governor Belcher’s administration, Mr. Hooper was appointed to preach the election sermon. Covered with his black veil, he stood before the chief magistrate, the council, and the representatives, and wrought so deep an impression, that the legislative measures of that year, were characterized by all the gloom and piety of our earliest ancestral sway. THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 61 In this manner Mr. Hooper spent a long life, irre- proachable in outward act, yet shrouded in dismal suspicions; kind and loving, though unloved, and dimly feared; a man apart from men, shunned in their health and joy, but ever summoned to their aid in mortal anguish. -As years wore on, shedding their snows above his sable veil, he acquired a name throughout the New England churches, and they called him Father Hooper. Nearly all his parishion- ers, who were of mature age when he was settled, had been borne away by many a funeral: he had one congregation in the church, and a more crowded one in the church-yard ; and having wrought so late into the evening, and done his work so well, it was now good Father Hooper’s turn to rest. : Several persons were visible by the shaded candle- light, in the death-chamber of the old clergyman. Natural connexions he had none. But there was the decorously grave, though unmoved physician, seeking only to mitigate the last pangs of the patient whom he could not save. ‘There were the deacons, and other eminently pious members of his church. ‘There, also, was the Reverend Mr. Clark, of Westbury, a young and zealous divine, who had ridden in haste to pray by the bed-side of the expiring minister. There was the nurse, no hired handmaiden of death, but one whose calm affection had endured thus long in se- crecy, in solitude, amid the chill of age, and would not perish, even at the dying hour. Who, but Eliz- abeth! And there lay the hoary head of good Father Hooper upon the death-pillow, with the black veil 62 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. still swathed about his brow and reaching down over his face, so that each more difficult gasp of his faint breath caused it to stir. All through life that piece of crape had hung between him and the world : it had sehr him from cheerful brotherhood and woman’s love, and kept him in that saddest of all prisons, his own heart; and still it lay upon his face, as if to deepen the gloom of his darksome chamber, and shade him from the sunshine of eternity. For some time previous, his mind had been con- fused, wavering doubtfully between the past and the present, and hovering forward, as it were, at intervals, into the indistinctness of the world to come. ‘There had been feverish turns, which tossed him from side to side, and wore away what little strength he had. But in his most convulsive struggles, and in the wild- est vagaries of his intellect, when no other thought retained its sober influence, he still showed an awful solicitude lest the black veil should slip aside. Even if his bewildered soul could have forgotten, there was a faithful woman at his pillow, who, with averted eyes, would have covered that aged face, which she had last beheld in the comeliness of manhood. At length the death-stricken old man lay quietly in the torpor of mental and bodily exhaustion, with an im- perceptible pulse, and breath that grew fainter and fainter, except when a long, deep, and irregular in- spiration seemed to prelude the flight of his spirit. The minister of Westbury approached the bed- side. | ‘Venerable Father Hooper,’ said he, ‘ the moment THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. 63 of your release is at hand. Are you ready for the lifting of the veil, that shuts in time from eternity ?’ Father Hooper at first replied merely by a feeble motion of his head; then, apprehensive, perhaps, that his meaning might be doubtful, he exerted himself to speak. ‘Yea,’ said he, in faint accents, ‘my soul hath a patient weariness until that veil be lifted.’ ‘ And is it fitting,’ resumed the Reverend Mr. Clark, ‘that a man so given to prayer, of such a blameless example, holy in deed and thought, so far as mortal judgment may pronounce; is it fitting that a father in the church should leave a shadow on his memory, that may seem to blacken a life so pure? I pray you, my venerable brother, let not this thing be! Suffer us to be gladdened by your triumphant aspect, as you go to your reward. Before the veil of eter- nity be lifted, let me cast aside this black veil from your face!’ And thus speaking, the Reverend Mr. Clark bent forward to reveal the mystery of so many years. But, exerting a sudden energy, that made all the be- holders stand aghast, Father Hooper snatched both his hands from beneath the bed-clothes, and pressed them strongly on the black veil, resolute to struggle, if the minister of Westbury would contend with a dying man. ‘Never!’ cried the veiled clergyman. ‘On earth, never!’ ‘Dark old man!’ exclaimed the affrighted minister, ‘with what horrible crime upon your soul are you now passing to the judgment?’ 64 THE MINISTER’S BLACK VEIL. Father Hooper’s breath heaved ; it rattled in his throat; but, with a mighty effort, grasping forward with his hands, he caught hold of life, and held it back till he should speak. He even raised himself in bed ; and there he sat, shivering with the arms of death around him, while the black veil hung down, awful, at that last moment, in the gathered terrors of a life- time. And yet the faint, sad smile, so often there, now seemed to glimmer from its obscurity, and linger on Father Hooper’s lips. ‘ Why do you tremble at me alone?’ cried he, turn- ing his veiled face round the circle of pale spectators. ‘Tremble also at each other! Have men avoided me, and women shown no pity, and children screamed and fled, only for my black veil? What, but the mystery which it obscurely typifies, has made this piece of crape so awful > When the friend shows his inmost:heart to his friend ; the lover to his best-belov- © ed; when man does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely treasuring up the secret of his sin; then deem me’a monster, for the symbol beneath which I have lived, and die! I look around me, and, lo! on every visage a Black Veil i? While his auditors shrank from one another, in mutual affright, Father Hooper fell back upon his pillow, a veiled corpse, with a faint smile lingering on the lips. Still veiled, they laid him in his coffin, and a veiled corpse they bore him to the grave. The grass of many years has sprung up and withered on that grave, the burial-stone is moss-grown, and good Mr. Hooper’s face is dust; but awful is still the thought, that it mouldered beneath the Black Veil! THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. VOL, 1 5 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. There is an admirable foundation for a philosophic romance, in the curi- ous history of the early settlement of Mount Wollaston, or Merry Mount. In the slight sketch here attempted, the facts, recorded on the grave pages of our New England annalists, have wrought themselves, almost sponta- neously, into a sort of allegory. The masques, mummeries, and festive customs, described in the text, are in accordance with the manners of the age. Authority, on these points, may be found in Strutt’s Book of Eng- lish Sports and Pastimes. BricHt were the days at Merry Mount, when the May-Pole was the banner-staff of that gay colony ! They who reared it, should their banner be triumph- ant, were to pour sun-shine over New England’s rug- ged hills, and scatter flower-seeds throughout the soil. Jollity and gloom were contending for an empire. Midsummer eve had come, bringing deep verdure to the forest, and roses in her lap, of a more vivid hue than the tender buds of Spring. But May, or her mirthful spirit, dwelt all the year round at Merry 68 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. Mount, sporting with the Summer months, and revel- ing with Autumn, and basking in the glow of Win- ter’s fireside. Through a world of toil and care, she flitted with a dreamlike smile, and came hither to find a home among the lightsome hearts of Merry Mount. Never had the May-Pole been so gaily decked as at sunset on midsummer eve. This venerated em- blem was a pine tree, which had preserved the slen- der grace of youth, while it equaled the loftiest height of the old wood monarchs. From its top streamed a silken banner, colored like the rainbow. Down nearly to the ground, the pole was dressed with birchen boughs, and others of the liveliest green, and some with silvery leaves, fastened by ribbons that fluttered in fantastic knots of twenty different colors, but no sad ones. Garden flowers, and blossoms of the wil- derness, laughed gladly forth amid the verdure, so fresh and dewy, that they must have grown by magic on that happy pine tree. Where this green and flowery splendor terminated, the shaft of the May- Pole was stained with the seven brilliant hues of the banner at its top. On the lowest green bough hung an abundant wreath of roses, some that had. been gathered in the sunniest spots of the forest, and others, of still richer blush, which the colonists had reared from English seed. Oh, people of the Golden Age, the chief of your husbandry, was to raise flowers ! But what was the wild throng that stood hand in hand about the May-Pole? It could not be, that the Fauns and Nymphs, when driven from their classic groves and homes of ancient fable, had sought refuge, THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 69 as all the persecuted did, in the fresh woods of the West. These were Gothic monsters, though perhaps of Grecian ancestry.. On the shoulders of a comely youth, uprose the head and branching antlers of a stag; a second, human in all other points, had the grim visage of a wolf; a third, still with the trunk and limbs of a mortal man, showed the beard and horns of a venerable he-goat. There was the like- ness of a bear erect, brute. in all but his hind legs, which were adorned with pink silk stockings. And here again, almost as wondrous, stood a real bear of the dark forest, lending each of his fore-paws to the grasp of a human hand, and as ready for the dance as any in that circle. His inferior nature rose half- way, to meet his companions as they stooped. Other faces wore the similitude of man or woman, but dis- torted or extravagant, with red noses pendulous before their mouths, which seemed of awful depth, and stretched from ear to ear in an eternal fit of laughter. Here might be seen the Salvage Man, well known in heraldry, hairy as a baboon, and girdled with green leaves. By his side, a nobler figure, but still a counterfeit, appeared an Indian hunter, with feathery crest and wampum belt. Many of this strange com- pany wore fools-caps, and had little bells appended to their garments, tinkling with a silvery sound, respon- sive to the inaudible music of their gleesome spirits. Some youths and maidens were of soberer garb, yet well maintained their places in the irregular throng, by the expression of wild revelry upon their features. Such were the colonists of Merry Mount, as they 70 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. stood in the broad smile of sunset, round their vene- rated May-Pole. Had a wanderer, bewildered in the melancholy forest, heard their mirth, and stolen a half-affrighted glance, he might have fancied them the crew of Co- mus, some already transformed to brutes, some mid- way between man and beast, and the others rioting in the flow of tipsy jollity that foreran the change. But a band of Puritans, who watched the scene, invisible themselves, compared the masques to those devils and ruined souls, with whom their superstition peopled the black wilderness. Within the ring of monsters; appeared the two air- iest forms, that had ever trodden on any more solid footing than a purple and golden cloud. One was a youth, in glistening apparel, with a scarf of the rain- bow pattern crosswise on his breast. His right hand held a gilded staff, the ensign of high dignity among the revelers, and his left grasped the slender fingers of a fair maiden, not less gaily decorated than him- self. Bright roses ‘glowed in contrast with the dark and glossy curls of each, and were scattered round their feet, or had sprung up spontaneously there. Be- hind this lightsome couple, so close to the May-Pole, that its boughs shaded his jovial face, stood the figure of an English priest, canonically dressed, yet decked with flowers, in Heathen fashion, and wearing a chap- let of the native vine leaves. By the riot of his roll- ing eye, and the pagan decorations of his holy garb, he seemed the wildest monster there, and the very Comus of the crew. THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 71 ‘ Votaries of the May-Pole,’ cried the flower-decked priest, ‘ merrily, all day long, have the woods echoed to your mirth. But be this your merriest hour, my hearts! Lo, here stand the Lord and Lady of the May, whom I, a clerk of Oxford, and high-priest of Merry Mount, am presently to join in holy matrimo- ny. Up with your nimble spirits, ye morrice-dancers, green men, and glee-maidens, bears and wolves, and horned gentlemen! Come ; a chorus now, rich with the old mirth of Merry England, and the wilder glee of this fresh forest; and then a dance, to show the youthful pair what life is made of, and how airily they should go through it! All ye that love the May-Pole, lend your voices to the nuptial song of the Lord and Lady of the May!’ This wedlock was more serious than most affairs of Merry Mount, where jest and delusion, trick and fantasy, kept up a continual carnival. ‘The Lord and Lady of the May, though their titles must be laid down at sunset, were really and truly to be partners for the dance of life, beginning the measure that same bright eve. ‘The wreath of roses, that hung from the lowest green bough of the May-Pole, had been twined for them, and would be thrown over both their heads, in symbol of their flowery union. When the priest had spoken, therefore, a riotous uproar burst from the rout of monstrous figures. ‘Begin you the stave, reverend Sir,’ cried they all; ‘and never did the woods ring to such a merry peal, as we of the May-Pole shall send up!’ Immediately a prelude of pipe, cittern, and viol, 72 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. touched with practised minstrelsy, began to play from a neighboring thicket, in such a mirthful cadence, that the boughs of the May-Pole quivered to the sound. But the May Lord, he of the gilded staff, chancing to look into his lady’s eyes, was wonder- struck at the almost pensive glance that met his own. ‘ Edith, sweet Lady of the May,’ whispered he, re- proachfully, ‘is yon wreath of roses a garland to hang: above our graves, that you look so sad? Oh, Edith, this is our golden time! ‘Tarnish it not by any pensive shadow of the mind ; for it may be, that nothing of futurity will be brighter aa the mere remembrance of what is now passing.’ ‘That was the very thought that saddened me! How came it in your mind too ?” said Edith, in a still lower tone than he; for it was high treason to be sad at Merry Mount. ‘Therefore do I sigh amid this festive music. And besides, dear Edgar, I struggle as with a dream, and fancy that these shapes of our jovial friends are visionary, and their mirth unreal, and that we are no true Lord and Lady of the May. What is the mystery in my heart ?’ Just then, as if a spell had loosened them, evista came a little shower of withering rose leaves from the May-Pole. Alas, for the young lovers! No sooner had their hearts glowed with real passion, than they were sensible of something vague and unsubstantial in their former pleasures, and felt a dreary presentiment of inevitable change. From the moment that they truly loved, they had subjected themselves to earth’s doom of care, and sorrow, and THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 13 troubled joy, and had no more a home at Merry Mount. ‘That was Edith’s mystery. Now leave we the priest to marry them, and the masquers to sport round the May-Pole, till the last sunbeam be with- drawn from its summit, and the shadows of the forest mingle gloomily in the dance. Meanwhile, we may discover who these gay people were. Two hundred years ago, and more, the old world and its inhabitants became mutually weary of each other. Men yoyaged by thousands to the West ; some to barter glass beads, and such like jewels, for the furs of the Indian hunter ; some to conquer virgin empires; and one stern band to pray. But none of these motives had much weight with the colonists of Merry Mount. Their leaders were men who had sported so long with life, that when Thought and Wisdom came, even these unwelcome guests were led astray, by the crowd of vanities which they should have put to flight. Erring Thought and perverted Wisdom were made to put on masques, and play the fool. The men of whom we speak, after losing the heart’s fresh gaiety, imagined a wild philosophy of pleasure, and came hither to act out their latest day- dream. They gathered followers from all that giddy tribe, whose whole life is like the festal days of soberer men. In their train were minstrels, not un- known in London streets ; wandering players, whose theatres had been the halls of noblemen ; mummers, ropé-dancers, and mountebanks, who would long be missed at wakes, church-ales, and fairs; in a word, mirth-makers of every sort, such as abounded in that 74 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. age, but now began to be discountenanced by the rapid growth of Puritanism. Light had their foot- steps been on land, and as lightly they came across the sea. Many had been maddened by their pre- vious troubles into a gay despair; others were as madly gay in the flush of youth, like the May Lord and his Lady ; but whatever might be the quality of their mirth, old and young were gay at Merry Mount. The young deemed themselves happy. The elder spirits, if they knew that mirth was but the counter- feit of happiness, yet followed the false shadow wil- fully, because at least her garments glittered bright- est. Sworn triflers of a life-time they would not venture among the sober truths of life, not even to be truly blest. , All the hereditary pastimes of Old England were transplanted hither. The King of Christrnas was duly crowned, and the Lord of Misrule bore potent sway. On the eve of Saint John, they felled whole acres of the forest to make bonfires, and danced by the blaze all night, crowned with garlands, and throwing flowers into the flame. At harvest time, though their crop was of the smallest, they made an image with the sheaves of Indian corn, and wreathed it with autumnal garlands, and bore it home triumph- antly. But what chiefly characterized the colo- nists of Merry Mount, was their veneration for the May-Pole. It has made their true history a poet’s tale. Spring decked the hallowed emblem with young blossoms and fresh green boughs; Summer brought roses of the deepest blush, and the perfected foliage THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. ve) of the forest; Autumn enriched it with that red and yellow gorgeousness, which converts each wild-wood leaf into a painted flower; and Winter silvered it with sleet, and hung it round with icicles, till it flash- ed in the cold sunshine, itself a frozen sunbeam. Thus each alternate season did homage to the May- Pole, and paid it a tribute of its own richest splendor. Its votaries danced round it, once, at least, in every month ; sometimes they called it their religion, or their altar; but always, it was the banner-staff of Merry Mount. Unfortunately, there were men in the new world, of a sterner faith than these May-Pole worshipers. Not far from Merry Mount was a settlement of Puri- tans, most dismal wretches, who said their prayers before daylight, and then wrought in the forest or the cornfield, till evening made it prayer time again. Their weapons were always at hand, to shoot down the straggling savage. When they met in conclave, it was never to keep up the old English mirth, but to hear sermons three hours long, or to proclaim boun- ties on the heads of wolves and the scalps of Indians. Their festivals were fast-days, and their chief pastime the singing of psalms. Woe to the youth or maiden, who did but dream of a dance! The selectman nod- ded to the constable ; and there sat the light-heeled reprobate in the stocks; or if he danced, it was round the whipping-post, which might be termed the Puritan May-Pole. A party of these grim Puritans, toiling through the difficult woods, each with a horse-load of iron armor 76 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. to burthen his footsteps, would sometimes draw near the sunny precincts of Merry Mount. There were the silken colonists, sporting round their May-Pole ; perhaps teaching a bear to dance, or striving to communicate their mirth to the grave Indian; or masquerading in the skins of deer and wolves, which they had hunted for that especial purpose. Often, the whole colony were playing at blindman’s buff, magistrates and all with their eyes bandaged, except a single scape-goat, whom the blinded sinners pursued by the tinkling of the bells at his garments. Once, it is said, they were seen following a flower-decked corpse, with merriment and festive music, to his grave. But did the dead man laugh? In their quiet- est times, they sang ballads and told tales, for the edification of their pious visiters ; or perplexed them with juggling tricks; or grinned at them through horse-collars; and when sport itself grew wearisome, they made game of their own stupidity, and began a yawning match. At the very least of these enormi- ties, the men of iron shook their heads and frowned so darkly, that the revelers looked up, imagining that a momentary cloud had overcast the sunshine, which was to be perpetual there. On the other hand, the Puritans affirmed, that, when a psalm was pealing from their place of worship, the echo, which the forest sent them back, seemed often like the chorus of a jolly catch, closing with a roar of laugh- ter. Who but the, fiend, and his bond-slaves, the crew of Merry Mount, had thus disturbed them! In due time, a feud arose, stern and bitter. on one side, THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 717 and as serious on the other as any thing could be, among such light spirits as had sworn allegiance to the May-Pole. The future complexion of New Eng- land was involved in this important quarrel. Should the grisly saints establish their jurisdiction over the gay sinners, then would their spirits darken all the clime, and make it a land of clouded visages, of hard toil, of sermon and psalm for ever. But should the banner-staff of Merry Mount be fortunate, sunshine would break upon the hills, and flowers would beau- tify the forest, and late posterity do homage to the May-Pole. After these authentic passages from history, we return to the nuptials of the Lord and Lady of the May. Alas! we have delayed too long, and must darken our tale too suddenly. As we glance again at the May-Pole, a solitary sun-beam is fading from the summit, and leaves only a faint golden tinge, blended with the hues of the rainbow banner. Even that dim light is now withdrawn, relinquishing the whole domain of Merry Mount to the evening gloom, which has rushed so instantaneously from the black surrounding woods. But some of these black shadows have rushed forth in human shape. Yes: with the setting sun, the last day of mirth had passed from Merry Mount. The ring of gay masquers was disordered and broken; the stag low- ered his antlers in dismay ; the wolf grew weaker than a lamb; the bells of the morrice-dancers tinkled with tremulous affright. The Puritans had played a characteristic part in the May-Pole mummeries. 718 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. Their darksome figures were intermixed with the wild shapes of their foes, and made the scene a pic- ture of the moment, when waking thoughts start up amid the scattered fantasies of a dream. The leader of the hostile party stood in the centre of the circle, while the rout of monsters cowered around him, like evil spirits in the presence of a dread magician. No fantastic foolery could look him in the face. So stern was the energy of his aspect, that the whole man, visage, frame, and soul, seemed wrought of iron, gifted with life and thought, yet all of one substance with his head-piece and breast-plate. It was the Puritan of Puritans; it was Endicott himself! . ‘Stand off, priest of Baal!” said he, with a grim frown, and laying no reverent hand upon the sur- plice. ‘I know thee, Blackstone!’ Thou art the man, who couldst not abide the rule even of thine own corrupted church, and hast come hither to preach iniquity, and to give example of it in thy life. But now shall it be seen that the Lord hath sanctified this wilderness for his peculiar people. Woe unto them that would defile it! And first, for this flower- decked abomination, the altar of thy worship !” And with his keen sword, Endicott assaulted the hallowed May-Pole. Nor long did it resist his arm. It groaned with a dismal sound§ it showered leaves and rose-buds upon the remorseless enthusiast ; and 1 Did. Governor Endicott speak less positively, we should suspect a mistake here. The Rev. Mr. Blackstone, though an eccentric, is not known to have been an immoral man. We rather doubt his identity with the priest of Merry Mount. THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 79 finally, with all its green boughs, and ribbons, and flowers, symbolic of departed pleasures, down fell the banner-staff of Merry Mount. As it sank, tradition says, the evening sky grew darker, and the woods threw forth a more sombre shadow. ‘There,’ cried Endicott, looking triumphantly on his work, ‘there lies the only May-Pole in New England! The thought is strong within me, that, by its fall, is shadowed forth the fate of light and idle mirth-makers, amongst us and our posterity. Amen, saith John Endicott!” | ‘Amen!’ echoed his followers. But the votaries of the May-Pole gave one groan for their idol. At the sound, the Puritan leader glanced at the crew of Comus, each a figure of broad mirth, yet, at this moment, strangely expressive of sorrow and dismay. ‘ Valiant captain,’ quoth Peter Palfrey, the Ancient of the band,‘ what order shall be taken with the pris- oners ?’ | ‘I thought not to repent me of cutfing down a May-Pole,’ replied Endicott, ‘ yet now I could find in my heart to plant it again, and give each of these bestial pagans one other dance round their idol. It would have served rarely for a whipping-post ! ’ ‘ But there are pine trees enow,’ suggested the lieu- tenant. ‘True, good Ancient,’ said the leader. ‘ Where- fore, bind the heathen crew, and bestow on them a small matter of stripes apiece, as earnest of our fu- ture justice, Set some of the rogues in the stocks to 80 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. rest themselves, so soon as Providence shall bring us to one of our own well-ordered settlements, where such accommodations may be found. Further pen- alties, such as branding and cropping of ears, shall be thought of hereafter.’ ‘How many stripes for the priest?’ inquired An- cient Palfrey. ‘None as yet,’ answered Endicott, bending his iron frown upon the culprit. ‘It must be for the Great and General Court to determine, whether stripes and long imprisonment, and other grievous penalty, may atone for his transgressions. Let him look to himself! For such as violate our civil order, it may be permitted us to show mercy. But woe to the wretch that troubleth our religion !’ ‘ And this dancing bear,’ resumed the officer. ‘ Must he share the stripes of his fellows ?’ ‘Shoot him through the head!” said the dterbdtic Puritan. ‘I suspect witchcraft in the beast.’ * Here be a couple of shining ones,’ continued Peter Palfrey, pointing his weapon at the Lord and Lady of the May. ‘They seem to be of high station among these misdoers. Methinks their dignity will not be fitted with less than-a double share of stripes.’ Endicott rested on his sword, and closely surveyed the dress and aspect of the hapless pair. ‘There they stood, pale, downcast, and apprehensive. Yet there was an air of mutual support, and of pure affection, seeking aid and giving it, that showed them to be man and wife, with the sanction ofa priest upon their love. The youth, in the peril of the moment, had THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 8] dropped his gilded staff, and thrown his arm about the Lady of the May, who leaned against his breast, too lightly to burthen him, but with weight enough to express that their destinies were linked together, for good orevil. ‘They looked first at each other, and then into the grim captain’s face. There they stood, in the first hour of wedlock, while the idle pleasures, of which their companions where the emblems, had given place to the sternest cares of life, personified by the dark Puritans. But never had their youthful beauty seemed so pure and high, as when its glow was chastened by adversity. ‘Youth,’ said Endicott, ‘ ye stand in an evil case, thou and thy maiden wife. Make ready presently ; for | am minded that ye shall both have a token to remember your wedding-day! ’ ‘Stern man,’ cried the May Lord, ‘how can I move thee? Were the means at hand, I would resist to the death. Being powerless, I entreat! Do with me as thou wilt; but let Edith go untouched !’ ‘Not so,’ replied the immitigable zealot. ‘Weare not wont to show an idle courtesy to that sex, which requireth the stricter discipline. What sayest thou, maid? Shall thy silken bridegroom suffer thy share of the penalty, besides his own?’ ‘ Be it death,’ said Edith,’ ‘and lay it all on me!” Truly, as Endicott had said, the poor lovers stood in a woeful case. Their foes were triumphant, their friends captive and abased, their home desolate, the benighted wilderness around them, and a rigorous destiny, in the shape of the Puritan leader, their only VOL. I. 6 82 THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. guide. Yet the deepening twilight could not alto- gether conceal, that the iron man was softened ; he smiled, at the fair spectacle of early love ; he almost sighed, for the inevitable blight of early hopes. ‘The troubles of life have come hastily on this young couple,’ observed Endicott. * We willsee how they comport themselves under ‘their present trials, ere we burthen them with greater. If, among the spoil, there be any garments of a more decent fashion, let them be put upon this May Lord and his Lady, instead of their glistening vanities. Look to it, some of you.’ ‘And shall not the youth’s hair be cut?’ asked Peter Palfrey, looking with abhorrence at the love- lock and long glossy curls of the young man. ‘Crop it forthwith, and that in the true pumpkin- shell fashion,’ answered the captain. ‘Then bring them along with us, but more gently than their fel- lows. There be qualities in the youth, which may make him valiant to fight, and sober to toil, and pious to pray; and in the maiden, that may fit her to be- come a mother in our Israel, bringing up babes in bet- ter nurture than her own hath been. Nor think ye, young ones, that they are the happiest, even in our lifetime of a moment, who misspend it in dancing round a May-Pole !’ And Endicott, the severest Puritan of all who laid the rock-foundation of New England, lifted the wreath of roses from the ruin of the May-Pole, and threw it, with his own gauntleted hand, over the heads of the Lord and Lady of the May. It was a deed of pro- THE MAY-POLE OF MERRY MOUNT. 83 phecy. As the moral gloom of the world overpow- ers all systematic gaiety, even so was their home of wild mirth made desolate amid the sad forest. They returned to itno more. But, as their flowery garland was wreathed of the brightest roses that had grown ' there, so, in the tie that united them, were intertwined all the purest and best of their early joys. They went heavenward, supporting each other along the difficult path which it was their lot to tread, and never wasted one regretful thought on the vanities of Merry Mount. THE GENTLE BOY. THE GENTLE BOY. In the course of the year 1656, several of the peo- ple called Quakers, led, as they professed, by the in- ward movement of the spirit, made their appearance in New England. ‘Their reputation, as holders of mystic and pernicious principles, having spread before them, the Puritans early endeavored to banish, and to prevent the further intrusion of the rising sect. But the measures by which it was intended to purge the land of heresy, though more than sufficiently vig- orous, were entirely unsuccessful. The Quakers, esteeming persecution as a divine call to the post of danger, laid claim to a holy courage, unknown to the Puritans themselves, who had shunned the cross, by providing for the peaceable exercise of their religion in a distant wilderness. ‘Though it was the singular fact, that every nation of the earth rejected the wan- 88 THE GENTLE BOY. dering enthusiasts who practised peace towards all men, the place of greatest uneasiness and peril, and therefore, in their eyes the most eligible, was the province of Massachusetts Bay. The fines, imprisonments, and stripes, liberally dis- tributed by our pious forefathers; the popular antipa- thy, so strong that it endured nearly a hundred years after actual persecution had ceased, were attractions as powerful for the Quakers, as peace, honor, and re- ward, would have been for the worldly-minded. Every European vessel ‘brought new cargoes of the sect, eager to testify against the oppression which they hoped to share; and, when ship-masters were re- strained by heavy fines from affording them passage, they made long and circuitous journeys through the Indian country, and appeared in the province as if conveyed by a supernatural power. ‘Their enthusi- asm, heightened almost to madness by the treatment which they received, produced actions contrary to the rules of decency, as well as of rational religion, and presented a singular contrast to the calm and staid de- portment of their sectarian successors of the present day. The command of the spirit, inaudible except to the soul, and not to be controverted on grounds of human wisdom, was made a plea for most indecorous exhibitions, which, abstractedly considered, well de- served the moderate chastisement of the rod. ‘These extravagances, and the persecution which was at once their cause and consequence, continued to increase, till, in the year 1659, the government of Massachu- setts Bay indulged two members of the Quaker sect with the crown of martyrdom. THE GENTLE BOY. 89 An indelible stain of blood is upon the hands of all who consented to this act, but a large share of the awful responsibility must rest upon the person then at the head of the government. He was a manof narrow mind and imperfect education, and his uncompromis- ing bigotry was made hot and mischievous by violent and hasty passions; he exerted his influence indeco- rously and unjustifiably to compass the death of the enthusiasts; and his whole conduct, in respect to them, was marked by brutal cruelty. ‘The Quakers, whose revengeful feelings were not less deep because they were inactive, remembered this man and his as- sociates, in after times. The historian of the sect affirms that, by the wrath of Heaven, a blight fell upon the land in the vicinity of the ‘ bloody town ” of Boston, so that no wheat would grow there ; and he takes his stand, as it were, among the graves of the ancient persecutors, and triumphantly recounts the judgments that overtook them, in old age or at the parting hour. He tells us that they died suddenly, and violently, and in madness ; but nothing can ex- ceed the bitter mockery with which he records the loathsome disease, and ‘death by rottenness,’ of the fierce and cruel governor. # % % * On the evening of the autumn day, that*had wit- nessed the martyrdom of two men of the Quaker per- suasion, a Puritan settler was returning from the me- tropolis to the neighboring country town in which he resided. The air was cool, the sky clear, and the lingering twilight was made brighter by the rays of a 90 THE GENTLE BOY. young moon, which had now nearly reached the verge of the horizon. The traveller, a man of middle age, wrapped in a grey frieze cloak, quickened his pace when he had reached the outskirts of the town, for a gloomy extent of nearly four miles lay between him and his home. ‘The low, straw-thatched houses were scattered at considerable intervals along the rogd, and the country having been settled but about thirty years, the tracts of original forest still bore no small pro- portion tothe cultivated ground. ‘The autumn wind wandered among the branches, whirling away the leaves from all except the pine trees, and moaning as if it lamented the desolation of which it was the in- strument. The road had penetrated the mass of woods that lay nearest to the town, and was just emerging into. an open space, when the traveller’s ears were saluted by a sound more mournful than even that of the wind. It was like the wailing of some one in distress, and it seemed to proceed from beneath a tall and lonely fir tree, in the centre of a cleared, but unenclosed and uncultivated field. .The Puritan could not but remember that this was the very spot, which had been made accursed a few hours before, by the execution of the Quakers, whose bodies had been thrown together into one hasty grave, beneath the tree on which they suffered. He struggled, how- ever, against the superstitious fears which belonged to the age, and compelled himself to pause and listen. ‘ The voice is most likely mortal, nor have I cause to trernble if it be otherwise,’ thought he, straining his eyes through the dim moonlight. ‘ Methinks it is like THE GENTLE BOY. 91 the wailing of a child ; some infant, it may be, which has strayed from its mother, and chanced upon this place of death. For the ease of mine own conscience, I must search this matter out.’ He therefore left the path, and walked somewhat fearfully across the field. ‘Though now so desolate, its soil,was pressed down and trampled by the thou- sand footsteps of those. who had witnessed the specta- cle of that day, all of whom had now retired, leaving the dead to their loneliness. The traveller at length reached the fir tree, which from the middle upward was covered with living branches, although a scaffold had been erected beneath, and other preparations made for the work of death. Under this unhappy tree, which in after times was believed to drop poison with its dew, sat the one solitary mourner for innocent blood. It was a slender and light-clad little boy, who leaned his face upon a hillock of fresh-turned and half-frozen earth, and wailed bitterly, yet in a sup- pressed tone, as if his grief might receive the punish- ment of crime... The Puritan, whose approach had been unperceived, laid his hand upon the child’s shoulder, and addressed him compassionately. ‘You have chosen a dreary lodging, my poor boy, and no wonder that you weep,’ said he. ‘ But dry your eyes, and tell me where your mother dwells. I promise you, if the journey be not too far, I will leave you in her arms to-night.’ The boy had hushed his wailing at once, and turn- ed his face upward to the stranger. It was a pale, bright-eyed countenance, certainly not more than SIX 92 THE GENTLE BOY. years old, but sorrow, fear, and want, had destroyed much of its infantile expression. ‘The Puritan, see- ing the boy’s frightened gaze, and feeling that he trembled under his hand, endeavored to reassure him. ‘Nay, if I intended to do you harm, little lad, the readiest way were to leave you here. What! you do not-fear to sit beneath the gallows on a new-made grave, and yet you tremble at a friend’s touch. ‘Take heart, child, and tell me what is your name, and where is your home?’ ‘Friend,’ replied the little boy, in a sweet, though faltering voice, ‘they call me Ibrahim, and my home is here.’ | The pale, spiritual face, the eyes that seemed to mingle with the moonlight, the sweet, airy voice, and the outlandish name, almost made the Puritan believe, that the boy was in truth a being which had sprung up out of the grave on which he sat. But perceiving that the apparition stood the test of a short mental prayer, and remembering that the arm which he had touched was life-like, he adopted a more rational sup- position. ‘The poor child is stricken in his intellect,’ thought he, ‘but verily his words are fearful, in a place like this.’ He then spoke soothingly, intending to humor the boy’s fantasy. ‘Your home will scarce be comfortable, I[brahim, this cold autumn night, and I fear you are ill provided with food. I am hastening to a warm supper and bed, and if you will go with me, you shall share them !? ‘I thank thee, friend, but though I be hungry and THE GENTLE BOY. va. shivering with cold, thou wilt not give me food nor lodging,’ replied the boy, in the quiet tone which despair had taught him, even so young. ‘ My father was of the people whom all men hate. They have laid him under this heap of earth, and here is my home.’ The Puritan, who had laid hold of little Ilbrahim’s hand, relinquished it as if he were touching a loath- some reptile. But he possessed a compassionate heart, which not even religious prejudice could harden into stone. ‘God forbid thatI should leave this child to perish, though he comes of the accursed sect,’ said he to himself. ‘Do we not all spring from an evil root? Are we not all in darkness till the light doth shine upon us? He shall not perish, neither in body, nor, if prayer and instruction may avail for him, in soul.’ He then spoke aloud and kindly to Ilbrahim, who had again hid his face in the cold earth of the grave. ‘Was every door in the land shut against you, my child, that you have wandered to this unhallowed spot ?’ ‘They drove me forth from the prison when they took my father thence,’ said the boy, ‘and I stood afar off, watching the crowd of people, and when they were gone, I came hither, and found only this grave. I knew that my father was sleeping here, and I said, this shall be my home.’ ‘No, child, no; not while I have a roof over my head, or a morsel to share with you!’ exclaimed the Puritan, whose sympathies were now fully excited. 94. THE GENTLE BOY. ‘Rise up and come with me, and fear not any harm.’ The boy wept afresh, and clung to the heap of earth, as if the cold heart beneath it were warmer to him than any in a living breast. The traveller, how- ever, continued to entreat him tenderly, and seeming to acquire some degree of confidence, he at length arose. But his slender limbs tottered with weakness, - his little head grew dizzy, and he leaned against the tree of death for support. ‘ My poor boy, are you so feeble ?? said. the Puri- tan. ‘ When did you taste food last ?’ ‘Tate of bread and water with my father in the prison,’ replied Ibrahim, ‘ but they brought him none neither yesterday nor to day, saying that he had eaten enough to bear him to his journey’s end. Trouble not thyself for my hunger, gi friend, for I have lacked food many times ere now.’ The traveller took the child in his arms and wrap- ped his cloak about him, while his heart stirred with shame and anger against the gratuitous cruelty of the instruments in this persecution. In the awakened warmth of his feelings, he resolved that, at whatever risk, he would not forsake the poor little defenceless being whom Heaven had confided to his care. With this determination, he left the accursed field, and re- sumed the homeward path from which the wailing of the boy had called him. The light and motionless burthen scarcely impeded his progress, and he soon beheld the fire-rays from the windows of the cottage which he, a native of a distant clime, had built in the THE GENTLE BOY. 95 western wilderness. It was surrounded by a consid- erable extent of cultivated ground, and the dwelling was situated in the nook of a wood-covered hill, whither it seemed to have crept for protection. ‘Look up, child, said the Puritan to Ibrahim, whose faint head had sunk upon his shoulder ; ‘ there is our home.’ At the word ‘home,’ a thrill passed through the child’s: frame, but he continued silent.. A few mo- ments brought them to the cottage-door, at which the owner knocked; for at that early period, when sava- ges were wandering everywhere among the settlers, bolt and bar were indispensable to the security of a dwelling. The summons was answered by a bond- servant, a coarse-clad and dull-featured piece of hu- manity, who, after ascertaining that his master was the applicant, undid the door, and held a flaring pine- knot torch to light him in. Farther back in the pas- sage-way, the red blaze discovered a matronly wo- man, but no little crowd of children came bounding forth to greet their father’s return. As the Puritan entered, he thrust aside his cloak, and displayed Ilbrahim’s face to the female. ‘Dorothy, here is a little outcast whom Providence hath put into our hands,’ observed he. ‘ Be kind to him, even as if he were of those dear ones who have departed from us.’ ‘What pale and bright-eyed little boy is this, To- bias ?’ she inquired. ‘ Is he one whom the wilderness folk have ravished from some Christian mother ?’ ‘No, Dorothy, this poor child is no captive from owt) 96 THE GENTLE BOY. j the wilderness,’ he replied. ‘The heathen savage would have given him to eat of his scanty morsel, and to drink of his birchen cup; but Christian men, alas! had cast him out to die.’ Then he told her how he had found him beneath the gallows, upon his father’s grave; and how his heart had prompted him, like the speaking of an inward voice, to take the little outcast home, and be kind unto him. He acknowledged his resolution to feed and clothe him, as if he were his own child, and to afford him the instruction which should counteract the pernicious errors hitherto instilled into his infant mind. Dorothy was gifted with even a quicker ten- derness than her husband, and she approved of all his doings and intentions. ‘ Have you a mother, dear child ?’ she ied The tears burst forth from his full heart, as he attempted to reply ; but Dorothy at length understood that he had a mother, who, like the rest of her sect, was a persecuted wanderer. She had been taken from the prison a short time before, carried into the uninhabited wilderness, and left to perish there by hunger or wild beasts. This was no uncommon method of disposing of the Quakers, and they were accustomed to boast, that the inhabitants of the desert were more hospitable to them than civilized man. ‘Fear not, little boy, you shall not need a mother, anda kind one,’ said Dorothy, when she had gathered this information. ‘ Dry your tears, Ilbrahim, and be my child, as I will be your mother.’ The good woman prepared the little bed, from stich THE GENTLE BOY. 97 her own children had successively been borne to another resting place. Before Ilbrahim would con- sent to occupy it, he knelt down, and as Dorothy listened to his simple and affecting prayer, she mar- veled how the parents that had taught it to him could have been judged worthy of death. When the boy had fallen asleep, she bent over his pale and spiritual countenance, pressed a kiss upon his white brow, drew the bed-clothes up about his neck, and went away with a pensive gladness in her heart. Tobias Pearson was not among the earliest emi- grants from the old country. He had remained in England during the first years of the civil war, in which he had borne some share as a cornet of dra- goons, under Cromwell. But when the ambitious de- signs of his leader began to develop themselves, he quitted the army of the parliament, and sought a re- fuge from the strife, which was no longer holy, among the people of his persuasion in the colony of Massa- chusetts. A more worldly consideration had perhaps an influence in drawing him thither; for New Eng- land offered advantages to men of unprosperous for- tunes, as well as to dissatisfied religionists, and Pear- son had hitherto found it difficult to provide for a wife and increasing family. To this supposed impurity of motive, the more bigoted Puritans were inclined to impute the removal by death of all the children, for whose earthly good the father had been over-thought- ful. They had left their native country blooming like roses, and like roses they had perished in a foreign soil. ‘Those expounders of the ways of Providence, VOL. I. 98 THE GENTLE BOY. who had thus judged their brother, and attributed his domestic sorrows to his sin, were not more charitable when they saw him and Dorothy endeavoring to fill up the void in their hearts, by the adoption of an in- fant of the accursed sect. Nor did they fail to com- municate their disapprobation to Tobias; but the lat- ter, in reply, merely pointed at the little quiet, lovely boy, whose appearance and deportment were indeed as powerful arguments as could possibly have been adduced in his own favor. Even his beauty, how- ever, and his winning manners, sometimes produced an effect ultimately unfavorable ; for the bigots, when the outer surfaces of their iron hearts had been soften- ed and again grew hard, affirmed that no merely natural cause could have so worked upon them. Their antipathy to the poor infant was also increas- ed by the ill success of divers theological discussions, in which it was attempted to conyince him of the er- rors of his sect. Ilbrahim, it is true, was not a skilful controversialist ; but the feeling of his religion was strong as instinct in him, and he could neither be en- ticed nor driven from the faith which his father had died for. ‘The odium of this stubbornness was shared in a great measure by the child’s protectors, insomuch that ‘Tobias and Dorothy very shortly began‘ to expe- rience a most bitter species of persecution, in the cold regards of many a friend whom they had valued. The common people manifested their opinions more openly. Pearson was a man of some consideration, being a Representative to the General Court, and an approved Lieutenant in the train-bands, yet within a THE GENTLE BOY. 99 week after his adoption of [lbrahim, he had been both hissed and hooted. Once, also, when walking through a solitary piece of woods, he heard a loud voice from some invisible speaker; and it cried, ‘ What shall be done to the backslider ? Lo! the scourge is knotted for him, even the whip of nine cords, and every cord three knots!’ These insults irritated Pearson’s tem- per for the moment ; they entered also into his heart, and became imperceptible but powerful workers to- wards an end, which his most secret thought had not yet whispered. % # * * On the second Sabbath after Ilbrahim became a member of their family, Pearson and-his wife deemed it proper that he should appear with them at public worship. They had anticipated some opposition to this measure from the boy, but he prepared himself in silence, and at the appointed hour was clad in the new mourning suit which Dorothy had wrought for him. As the parish was then, and during many sub- sequent years, unprovided with a bell, the signal for the commencement of religious exercises was the beat ofa drum. At the first sound of that martial call to the place-of holy and quiet thoughts, Tobias and Do- rothy set forth, each holding a hand of little Ibrahim, like two parents linked together by the infant of their love. On their path through the leafless woods, they were overtaken by many persons of their acquaint- ance, all of whom avoided them, and passed by on the other side ; but a severer trial awaited their con- stancy when they had descended the hill and drew Fad 100 THE GENTLE BOY. near the pine-built and undecorated house of prayer. Around the door, from which the drummer still sent forth his thundering summons, was drawn up a formi- dable phalanx, including several of the oldest mem- bers of the congregation, many of the middle-aged, and nearly all the younger males. Pearson found it difficult to sustain their united and disapproving gaze, but Dorothy, whose mind was differently circum- stanced, merely drew the boy.closer to her, and fal- tered not in her approach. As they entered the door, they overheard the muttered sentiments of the assem- blage, and when the reviling voices of the little child- ren smote Ilbrahim’s ear, he wept. The interior aspect of the meetinghouse was rude. The low ceiling, the unplastered walls, the naked wood-work, and the undraperied pulpit, offered nothing to excite the devotion, which, without such external aids, often remains latent in the heart. The floor of the building was. occupied by rows of long, cushion- less benches, supplying the place of pews, and the broad-aisle formed a sexual division, impassable ex- cept by children beneath a certain age. Pearson and Dorothy separated at the door of the meetinghouse, and Ilbrahim, being within the years of infancy, was retained under the care of the latter. The wrinkled beldams involved themselves in their rusty cloaks as he passed by ; even the mild-featured maidens seemed to dread contamination ; and many a stern old man arose, and turned his repulsive and un- heavenly countenance upon the gentle boy, as if the sanctuary were polluted by his presence. He wasa THE GENTLE BOY. 101 sweet infant of the skies, that had strayed away from his home, and all the inhabitants of this miserable world closed up their impure hearts against him, drew back their earth-soiled garments from his touch, and said, ‘ We are holier than thou.’ Ilbrahim, seated by the side of his adopted aothed and retaining fast hold of her hand, assumed a grave and decorous demeanor, such as might befit a person of matured taste and understanding, who should find himself in a temple dedicated to some worship which he did not recognise, but felt himself bound to respect. The exercises had not yet commenced, however, when the boy’s attention was arrested by an event, apparently of trifling interest. A woman, having her face muffled in a hood, and a cloak drawn completely about her form, advanced slowly up the broad-aisle and took place upon the foremost bench. Ilbrahim’s faint color varied, his nerves fluttered, he was unable to turn his eyes from the muffled female. When the preliminary prayer and hymn were over, the minister arose, and having turned the hour-glass which stood by the great bible, commenced his dis- course. He was now well stricken in years, a man of pale, thin countenance, and his grey hairs were closely covered by a black velvet scull-cap. In his younger days he had practically learned the meaning of persecution, from Archbishop Laud, and he was not now disposed to forget the lesson against which he had murmured then. Introducing the often dis- cussed subject of the Quakers, he gave a history of that sect, and a description of their tenets, in which 102 THE GENTLE BOY. error predominated, and prejudice distorted the aspect of what was true. He adverted to the recent meas- ures in the province, and cautioned his hearers of weaker parts against calling in question the just se- verity, which God-fearing magistrates had at length been compelled to exercise. He spoke of the danger of pity, in some cases a commendable and christian virtue, but inapplicable to this pernicious sect. He observed that such was their devilish obstinacy in er- ror, that even the little children, the sucking babes, were hardened and desperate heretics. He affirmed that no man, without Heaven’s especial warrant, should attempt their conversion, lest while he lent his hand to draw them from the slough, he should himself be precipitated into its lowest depths. The sands of the second hour were principally in the lower half of the glass, when the sermon con- cluded. An approving murmur followed, and the clergyman, having given out a hymn, took his seat with much self-congratulation, and endeavored to read the effect of his eloquence in the visages of the people. But while voices from all parts of the house were tuning themselves to sing, a scene occurred, which, though not very unusual at that period in the province, happened to be without precedent in this parish. The muffled female, who had hitherto sat motion- less in the front rank of the audience, now arose, and with slow, stately, and unwavering step, ascend- éd the pulpit stairs. The quaverings of incipient harmony were hushed, and the divine sat in speech- THE GENTLE BOY. 103 less and almost terrified astonishment, while she undid the door, and stood up in the sacred desk from which his maledictions had just been thundered. She then divested herself of the cloak and. hood, and appeared in a most singular array. A. shapeless robe of sackcloth was girded about her waist with a knotted cord; her raven hair fell down upon her shoulders, and its blackness was defiled by pale streaks of ashes, which she had strewn upon her head. Her eyebrows, dark and strongly defined, added to the deathly whiteness of a countenance which, emaciated with want, and wild with enthusi- asm and strange sorrows, retained no trace of earlier beauty. This figure stood gazing earnestly on the audience, and there was no sound, nor any move- ment, except a faint shuddering which every man observed in his neighbor, but was scarcely conscious of in himself. At length, when her fit of inspira- tion came, she spoke, for the first few moments, in a low voice, and not invariably distinct utterance. Her discourse gave evidence of an imagination hopelessly entangled with her reason; it was a vague and incomprehensible rhapsody, which, however, seemed to spread its own atmosphere round the hearer’s soul, and to move his feelings by some influence uncon- nected with the words. As she proceeded, beautiful but shadowy images would sometimes be seen, like bright things moving in a turbid river; or a strong and singularly shaped idea leapt forth, and seized at once on the understanding or the heart. But the course of her unearthly eloquence soon led her to 104 THE GENTLE BOY. the persecutions of her sect, and from thence the step was short to her own peculiar sorrows. She was naturally a woman of mighty passions, and hatred and revenge now wrapped themselves in the garb of piety ; the character of her speech was changed, her images became distinct though wild, and her denun- ciations had an almost hellish bitterness. ‘’lhe Governor and his mighty men,’ she said, ‘have gathered together, taking counsel among them- selves and saying, ‘‘ What shall we do unto this peo- ple — even unto the people that have come into this land to put our iniquity to the blush?” And lo! the devil entereth into the council-chamber, like a lame man of low stature and gravely appareled, with a dark and twisted countenance, and a bright, down- cast eye. And he standeth up among the rulers; yea, he goeth to and fro, whispering to each; and every man lends his ear, for his word is “slay, slay!” But I say unto ye, Woe to them that slay! Woe to them that shed the blood of saints! Woe to them that have slain the husband, and cast forth the child, the tender infant, to wander homeless, and hungry, and cold, till he die; and have saved the mother alive, in the cruelty of their tender mercies! Woe to them in their life-time, cursed are they in the delight and pleasure of their hearts! Woe to them in their death-hour, whether it come swiftly with blood and violence, or after long and lingering” pain! Woe, in the dark house, in the rottenness of the grave, when the children’s children shall revile the ashes of the fathers! Woe, woe, woe, at the THE GENTLE BOY. 105 judgment, when all the persecuted and all the slain in this bloody land, and the father, the mother, and the child, shall await them in a day that they cannot escape! Seed of the faith, seed of the faith, ye whose hearts are moving with a power that ye know not, arise, wash your hands of this innocent blood ! Lift your voices, chosen ones, cry aloud, and call down a woe and a judgment with me !’ Having thus given vent to the flood of malignity which she mistook for inspiration, the speaker was silent. Her voice was succeeded by the hysteric shrieks of several women, but.the feelings of the au- dience generally had not been drawn onward in the current with her own. ‘They remained stupefied, stranded as it were, in the midst of a torrent, which deafened them by its roaring, but might not move them by its violence. The clergyman, who could not hitherto have ejected the usurper of his pulpit otherwise than by bodily force, now addressed her in the tone of just indignation and legitimate au- thority. -¢ Get you down, woman, from the holy place which you profane,’ he said. ‘Is it to the Lord’s house that you come to pour forth the foulness of your heart, and the inspiration of the devil? Get you down, and remember that the sentence of death is on you; yea, and shall be executed, were it but for this day’s work ?? ‘I go, friend, I go, for the voice hath had its utter- ance,’ replied she, in a depressed and even mild tone. ‘I have done my mission unto thee and to thy 106 THE GENTLE BOY. people. Reward me with stripes, imprisonment, or death, as ye shall be permitted.’ The weakness of exhausted passion caused her steps to totter as she descended the pulpit stairs. The people, in the meanwhile, were stirring to and fro on the floor of the house, whispering among themselves, and glancing towards the intruder. Many of them now recognised her as the woman who had assaulted the Governor with frightful language, as he passed. by the window of her prison; they knew, also, that she was adjudged to suffer death, and had been preserved only by an involuntary banishment into the wilder- ness. ‘I'he new outrage, by which she had provoked her fate, seemed to render further lenity impossible ; and a gentleman in military dress, with a stout man of inferior rank, drew towards the door of the meet- ing-house, and awaited her approach. Scarcely did her feet press the floor, however, when an unexpected scene occurred. In that moment of her peril, when every eye frowned with death, a little timid boy pressed forth, and threw his arms round his mother. ‘J am here, mother, it is I, and I will go with thee to prison,’ he exclaimed. She gazed at him witha doubtful and almost fright- ened expression, for she knew that the boy had been cast out to perish, and she had not hoped to see his face again. She feared, perhaps, that it was but one of the happy visions, with which her excited fancy had often deceived her, in the solitude of the desert, or in prison. But when she felt his hand warm with- in her own, and heard his little eloquence of child- THE GENTLE BOY. 107 ish love, she began to know that she was yet a mother. ‘Blessed art thou, my son,’ she sobbed. ‘ My heart was withered; yea, dead with thee and with thy fa- ther ; and now it leaps as in the first moment when I pressed thee to my bosom.’ She knelt down, and embraced him again and again, while the joy that could find no words, expressed it- self in broken accents, like the bubbles gushing up to vanish at the surface of a deep fountain. ‘’he sor- rows of past years, and the darker peril that was nigh, cast not a, shadow on the brightness of that fleeting moment. Soon, however, the spectators saw a change ‘upon her face, as the consciousness of her sad estate returned, and grief supplied the fount of tears which joy had opened. By the words she uttered, it would seem that the indulgence of natural love had given her mind a momentary sense of its errors, and made her know how far she had strayed from duty, in fol- lowing the dictates of a wild fanaticism. ‘In a doleful. hour art thou returned to me, poor boy,’ she said, ‘for thy mother’s path has gone dark- ening onward, till now the end is death. Son, son, I have borne thee in my arms when my limbs were tottering, and 1 have fed thee with the food that I was fainting for; yet I have ill performed a mother’s part by thee in life, and now I leave thee no inheritance but woe and shame. Thou wilt go seeking through the world, and find all hearts closed against thee, and their sweet affections turned to bitterness for my sake. 108 THE GENTLE BOY. My child, my child, how many a pang awaits thy gentle spirit, and I the cause of all!” She hid her face on Ilbrahim’s head, and her long, raven hair, discolored with the ashes of her mourn- ing, fell down about him like a veil: A low and in- terrupted moan was the voice of her heart’s anguish, and it did not fail to move the sympathies of many who mistook their involuntary virtue for a sin. Sobs were audible in the female section of the house, and every man who was a father, drew his hand across his eyes. ‘Tobias Pearson was agitated and uneasy, but a certain feeling like the consciousness of guilt oppressed him, so that he could not go forth and offer himself as the protector of the child. Dorothy, how- ever, had watched her husband’s eye. Her mind was free from the influence that had begun to work on his, and she drew near the Quaker woman, and addressed her in the hearing of all the congregation. ‘Stranger, trust this boy to me, and I will be his mother,’ she said, taking Ilbrahim’s hand. * Provi- dence has signally marked out my husband to protect him, and he has fed at our table and lodged under our roof, now many days, till our hearts have grown very strongly unto him. Leave the tender child with us, and be at ease concerning his welfare.’ The Quaker rose from the ground, but drew the boy closer to her, while she gazed earnestly in Doro- thy’s face. Her mild, but saddened features, and neat, matronly attire, harmonized together, and were like a verse of fireside poetry. Her very aspect THE GENTLE BOY. 109 proved that she was blameless, so far as mortal could be so, in respect to God and man; while the enthu- siast, in her robe of sackcloth and girdle of knotted cord, had as evidently violated the duties of. the present life and the future, by fixing her attention wholly on the latter. The two females, as they held each a hand of Ibrahim, formed a practical allegory ; it was rational piety and unbridled fanaticism, con- tending for the empire of a young heart. ‘Thou art not of our people,’ said the Quaker, mournfully. ‘ No, wetare not of your people,’ replied Dorothy, with mildness, ‘ but we are Christians, looking upward to the same Heaven with you. Doubt not that your boy shall meet you there, if there be a blessing on our tender and prayerful guidance of him. ‘Thither, I trust, my own children have gone before me, for I also have been a mother; I am no longer so,’ she added, in a faltering tone, ‘ and your son will have all my care.’ ‘But will ye lead him in the path which his parents have trodden?’ demanded the Quaker. ‘Can ye teach him the enlightened faith which his father has died for, and for which I, even I, am soon to become an unworthy martyr? The boy has been baptized in blood ; will ye keep the mark fresh and ruddy upon his forehead ? ” ‘I will not deceive you,’ answered Dorothy. ‘If your child become our child, we must breed him up in the instruction which Heaven has imparted to us ; we must pray for him the prayers of our own faith ; 110 THE GENTLE BOY. we must do towards him according to the dictates of our own consciences, and not of your’s. Were we to act otherwise, we should abuse your trust, even in complying with your wishes.’ The mother looked down upon her boy with a troubled countenance, and then turned her eyes up- ward to heaven. She seemed to pray internally, and the contention of her soul was evident. ‘Friend,’ she said at length to Dorothy, ‘I doubt not that my son shall receive all earthly tenderness at thy hands. Nay, I will believe that even thy im- perfect lights may guide him to a better world ; for surely thou art on the path thither. But thou hast spoken of a husband. Doth he stand here among this multitude of people? Let him come forth, for I must know to whom IJ commit this most precious trust.’ She turned her face upon the male auditors, and after a momentary delay, Tobias Pearson came forth from among them. The Quaker saw the dress which marked his military rank, and shook her head ; but then she noted the hesitating air, the eyes that strug- gled with her own, and were vanquished ; the color that went and came, and could find no resting place. As she gazed, an unmirthful smile spread over her features, like sunshine that grows melancholy in some desolate spot. Her lips moved inaudibly, but at length she spake. . ‘[ hear it, I hear it. The voice speaketh within me and saith, ‘‘ Leave thy child, Catharine, for his place is here, and go hence, for I have other work THE GENTLE BOY. | Ell for thee. Break the bonds of natural affection, mar- tyr thy love, and know that in all these things eternal wisdom hath its ends.” I go, friends, I go. Take ye my boy, my precious jewel. I go hence, trusting that all shall be well, and that even for his infant hands there is a labor in the vineyard.’ She knelt down and whispered to Ilbrahim, who at first struggled and clung to his mother, with sobs and tears, but remained passive when she had kissed his cheek and arisen from the ground. Having held her hands over his head in mental prayer, she was ready to depart. ‘ Farewell, friends, in mine extremity,’ she said to Pearson and his wife; ‘the good deed ye have done me is a treasure laid up in heaven, to be returned a thousandfold hereafter. And farewell ye, mine ene- mies, to whom it is not permitted to harm so much as a hair of my head, nor to stay my footsteps even for a moment. The day is coming, when ye shall call upon me to witness for ye to this one sin uncommitted, and I will rise up and answer.’ She turned her steps towards the door, and the men, who had stationed themselves to guard it, withdrew, and suffered her to pass. A general sentiment of pity overcame the virulence of religious hatred. Sancti- fied by her love, and her affliction, she went forth, and all the people gazed after her till she had jour- neyed up the hill, and was lost behind its brow. She went, the apostle of her own unquiet heart, to renew the wanderings of past years. For her voice had been already heard in many lands of Christendom ; 112 THE GENTLE BOY. and she had pined in the cells of a Catholic Inquisi- tion, before she felt the lash, and lay in the dungeons of the Puritans. Her mission had extended also to the followers of the Prophet, and from them she had received the courtesy and kindness, which all the contending sects of our purer religion united to deny her. Her husband and herself had resided many months in Turkey, where even the Sultan’s counte- nance was gracious to them; in that pagan land, too, was Ilbrahim’s birthplace, and his oriental name was a mark of gratitude for the good deeds of an unbeliever. % # * % * When Pearson and his wife had thus acquired all the rights over Ibrahim that could be delegated, their affection for him became, like the memory of their native land, or their mild sorrow for the dead, a piece of the immovable furniture of their hearts. ‘The boy, also, after a week or two of mental disquiet, began to gratify his protectors, by many inadvertent proofs that he considered them as parents, and their house as home. Before the winter snows were melted, the persecuted infant, the little wanderer from a remote and heathen country, seemed native in the New England cottage, and inseparable from the warmth and security of its hearth. Under the influence of kind treatment, and in the consciousness that he was loved, Ilbrahim’s demeanor lost a premature manli- ness, which had resulted from his earlier situation ; he became more childlike, and his natural character displayed itself with freedom. It was in many re- THE GENTLE BOY. 118 spects a beautiful one, yet the disordered imagina- tions of both his father and mother had perhaps propagated a certain unhealthiness in the mind of the boy. In his general state, Ilbrahim would derive enjoyment from the most trifling events, and from every object about him; he seemed to discover rich treasures of happiness, by a faculty analogous to that of the witchhazel, which points to hidden gold where all is barren to the eye. His airy gaiety, coming to him from a thousand sources, communicated itself to the family, and Ilbrahim was like a domesticated sunbeam, brightening moody countenances, and chas- ing away the gloom from the dark corners of the cottage. ; On the other hand, as the susceptibility of pleasure is also that of pain, the exuberant cheerfulness of the boy’s prevailing temper sometimes yielded to mo- ments of deep depression. His sorrows could not always be followed up to their original source, but most frequently they appeared to flow, though IIbra- him was young to be sad for such a cause, from wounded love. ‘The flightiness of his mirth rendered him often guilty of offences against the decorum of a Puritan household, and on these occasions he did not invariably escape rebuke. But the slightest word of real bitterness, which he was infallible in distinguish- ing from pretended anger, seemed to sink into his heart and poison all his enjoyments, till he became sensible that he was entirely forgiven. Of thé malice, which generally accompanies a superfluity of sensi- tiveness, Ilbrahim, was altogether destitute; when VOL. I. 8 os cd 114 THE GENTLE BOY. trodden upon, he would not turn; when wounded, he could but die. His mind was wanting in the stamina for self-support; it was a plant that would, twine beautifully round something stronger than itself, but if repulsed, or torn away, it had no choice but to wither on the ground. Dorothy’s acuteness taught her that severity would crush the spirit of the child, and she nurtured him with the gentle care of one who handles a butterfly. Her husband manifested an equal affection, although it grew daily less pro- ductive of familiar caresses. The feelings of the neighboring people, in regard to the Quaker infant and his protectors, had not un- dergone a favorable change, in spite of the momen- tary triumph which the desolate mother had obtained over their sympathies. The scorn and bitterness, of which he was the object, Were very grievous to Ilbra- him, especially when any circumstance made him sensible that the children, his equals in age, partook of the enmity of their parents. His tender and social nature had already overflowed in attachments to everything about him, and still there was a residue of unappropriated love, which he yearned to bestow upon the little ones who were taught to hate him. As the warm days of spring came on, Ibrahim was ac- customed to remain for hours, silent and inactive, within hearing of the children’s voices at their play ; yet, with his usual delicacy of feeling, he avoided their notice, and would flee and hide himself from the smallest individual among them. Chance, how- ever, at length seemed to open a medium of commu- THE GENTLE BOY. 115 fication between his heart and theirs; it was by means of a boy about two years older than Ibrahim, who was injured by a fall from a tree in the vicinity of Pearson’s habitation. As the sufferer’s own home was at some distance, Dorothy willingly received him under her roof, and became his tender and careful nurse. Ilbrahim was the unconscious possessor of much skill in physiognomy, and it would have deterred him, in other circumstances, from gttempting to make a friend of this boy. The countenance of the latter immediately impressed a beholder disagreeably, but it required some examination to discover that the cause was a very slight distortion of the mouth, and the irregular, broken line, and near approach of the eye- brows. Analogous, perhaps, to these trifling deform- ities, was an almost inzperceptible twist of every joint, and the uneven prominence of the breast ; form- ing a body, regular in its general outline, but faulty in almost all its details. The disposition of the boy was sullen and reserved, and the village schoolmaster stigmatized him as obtuse in intellect ; although, at a later period of life, he evinced ambition and very peculiar talents. But whatever might be his personal or moral irregularities, Ilbrahim’s heart seized upon, and clung to him, from the moment that he was brought wounded into the cottage; the child of perse- cution seemed to compare his own fate with that of the sufferer, and to feel that even different modes of misfortune had created a sort of relationship between them. Food, rest, and the fresh air, for which he 116 THE GENTLE BOY. languished, were neglected; he nestled continually by the bed-side of the little stranger, and, with a fond jealousy, endeavored to be the medium of all the cares that were bestowed upon him. As the boy be- came convalescent, Ilbrahim contrived games suitable to his situation, or amused him by a faculty which he had perhaps breathed in with the air of his barbaric birthplace. It was that of reciting imaginary adven- tures, on the spur of the moment, and apparently in inexhaustible succesyon. His tales were of course monstrous, disjointed, and without aim; but they were curious on account of a vein of human tender- ness, which ran through them all, and was like a sweet, familiar face, encountered in the midst of wild and unearthly scenery. ‘The auditor paid much attention to these romances, and sometimes inter- rupted them by brief remarks upon the incidents, displaying shrewdness above his years, mingled with a moral obliquity which grated very harshly against Ilbrahim’s instinctive rectitude. Nothing, however, could arrest the progress of the latter’s affection, and there were many proofs that it met with a response from the dark and stubborn nature on which it was lavished. The boy’s parents at length removed him, to complete his cure under their own roof. Ilbrahim did not visit his new friend after his de- parture; but he made anxious and continual inquiries respecting him, and informed himself of the day when he was to reappear among his playmates. On a pleasant summer afternoon, the children of the neighborhood had assembled in the little forest- & THE GENTLE BOY. 117 crowned amphitheatre behind the meetinghouse, and the recovering invalid was there, leaning on a staff. The glee of a score of untainted bosoms was heard in light and airy voices, which danced among the trees like sunshine become audible; the grown men of this weary world, as they journeyed by the spot, marveled why life, beginning in such brightness, should proceed in gloom; and their hearts, or their imaginations, answered them and said, that the bliss of childhood gushes from its innocence. But it hap- pened that an unexpected addition was made to the heavenly little band. It was Ilbrahim, who came towards the children, with a look of sweet confidence on his fair and spiritual face, as if, having manifested his love to one of them, he had no longer to fear a repulse from their society. A hush came over their mirth, the moment they beheld him, and they stood whispering to each other while he drew nigh; but, all at once, the devil of their fathers entered into the unbreeched fanatics, and, sending up a fierce, shrill ery, they rushed upon the poor Quaker child. In an instant, he was the centre of a brood of baby-fiends, who lifted sticks against him, pelted him with stones, and displayed an instinct of destruction, far more loathsome than the blood-thirstiness of manhood. The invalid, in the meanwhile, stood apart from the tumult, crying out with a loud voice, ‘ Fear not, Ilbrahim, come hither and take my hand;’ and his unhappy friend endeavored to obey him. After watching the victim’s struggling approach, with a calm smile and unabashed eye, the foul-hearted little 118 THE GENTLE BOY. villain lifted his staff, and struck Ilbrahim on the mouth, so forcibly that the blood issued in a stream. The poor child’s arms had been raised to guard his head from the storm of blows; but now he dropped them at once. His persecutors beat him down, tram- pled upon him, dragged him by his long, fair locks, and Ilbrahim was on the point of becoming as verita- ble a martyr as ever entered bleeding into heaven. The uproar, however, attracted the notice of a few neighbors, who put themselves to the trouble of res- cuing the little heretic, and of conveying him to Pear- son’s door. Ilbrahim’s bodily harm was severe, but long and careful nursing accomplished his recovery ; the injury done to his sensitive spirit was more serious, though not so visible. Its signs were principally of a nega- tive character, and to be discovered only by those who had previously known him. His gait was thence- forth slow, even, and unvaried by the sudden bursts of sprightlier motion, which had once corresponded to his overflowing gladness; his countenance was heavier, and its former play of expression, the dance of sunshine reflected from moving water, was de- stroyed by the cloud over his existence ; his notice was attracted in a far less degree by passing events, and he appeared to find greater difficulty in compre- hending what was new to him, than at a happier period. A stranger, founding his judgment upon these circumstances, would have said that the dul- ness of the child’s intellect widely contradicted the promise of his features; but the secret was in the THE GENTLE BOY. 119 direction of Ilbrahim’s thoughts, which were brooding within him when they should naturally have been wandering abroad. An attempt of Dorothy to revive his former sportiveness was the single occasion, on which his quiet demeanor yielded to a violent display of grief; he burst into passionate weeping, and ran and hid himself, for his heart had become so misera- bly sore, that even the hand of kindness tortured it like fire. Sometimes, at night and probably in his dreams, he was heard to cry, ‘Mother! Mother!” as if her place, which a stranger had supplied while Ilbrahim was happy, admitted of no substitute in his extreme affliction. Perhaps, among the many life- weary wretches then upon the earth, there was not one who combined innocence and misery like this poor, broken-hearted infant, so soon the victim of his own heavenly nature. While this melancholy change had taken place in Ilbrahim, one of an earlier origin and of different character had come to its perfection in his adopted father. The incident with which this tale commences found Pearson in a state of religious dulness, yet mentally disquieted, and longing for a more fervid faith than he possessed. The first effect of his kind- ness to Ilbrahim was to produce a softened feeling, an incipient love for the child’s whole sect; but joined to this, and resulting perhaps from self-suspicion, was a proud and ostentatious contempt of their tenets and practical extravagances. In the course of much thought, however, for the subject struggled irresistibly into his mind, the foolishness of the doctrine began to 120 THE GENTLE BOY. be less evident, and the points which had particularly — offended his reason assumed another aspect, or van- ished entirely away. The work within him appeared to go even while he slept, and that which had been a doubt, when he laid down to rest, would often hold the place of a truth, confirmed by some forgotten de- monstration, when he recalled his thoughts in the morning. But while he was thus becoming assimila- ted to the enthusiasts, his contempt, in nowise decreas- ing towards them, grew very fierce against himself ; he imagined, also, that every face of his acquaintance wore a sneer, and that every word addressed to him was a gibe. Such was his state of mind at the period of Ilbrahim’s misfortune ; and the emotions consequent upon that event completed the change, of which the child had been the original instrument. In the mean time neither the fierceness of the perse- cutors, nor the infatuation of their victims, had de- creased. The dungeons were never empty; the streets of almost every village echoed daily with the lash ; the life of a woman, whose mild and christian spirit no cruelty could embitter, had been sacrificed ; and more innocent blood was yet to pollute the hands, that were so often raised in prayer. Larly after the Restoration, the English Quakers represented to Charles II. that a ‘vein of blood was open in his dominions ;’ but though the displeasure of the volup- tuous king was roused, his interference was not prompt. And now the tale must stride forward over many months, leaving Pearson to encounter ignominy and misfortune ; his wife to a firm endurance of a THE GENTLE BOY. 121 thousand sorrows; poor Ilbrahim to pine and droop like a cankered rose-bud ; his mother to wander ona mistaken errand, neglectful of the holiest trust which can be committed to a woman. % % ® * * A winter evening, a night of storm, had darkened over Pearson’s habitation, and there were no cheerful faces to drive the gloom from his broad hearth. The fire, it is true, sent forth a glowing heat and a ruddy light, and large logs, dripping with half-melted snow, lay ready to be cast upon the embers. But the apart- ment was saddened in its aspect by the absence of much of the homely wealth which had once adorned it; for the exaction of repeated fines, and his own neglect of temporal affairs, had greatly impoverished the owner. And with the furniture of peace, the im- plements of war had likewise disappeared ; the sword was broken, the helm and cuirass were cast away for ever; the soldier had done with battles, and might not lift so much as his naked hand to guard his head. But the Holy Book remained, and the table on which it rested was drawn before the fire, while two of the persecuted sect sought comfort from its pages. He who listened, while the other read, was the master of the house, now emaciated in form, and alter- ed as to the expression and healthiness of his coun- tenance ; for his mind had dwelt too long among visionary thoughts, and his body had been worn by imprisonment and stripes. The hale and weather- beaten old man, who sat beside him, had sustained less injury froma far longer course of the same mode of 122 THE GENTLE BOY. life. In person he was tall and dignified, and, which alone would have made him hateful to the Puritans, his grey locks fell from beneath the broad-brimmed hat, and rested on his shoulders. As the old man read the sacred page, the snow drifted against the windows, or eddied in at the crevices of the door, while a blast kept laughing in the chimney, and the blaze leaped fiercely up to seek it. And sometimes, when the wind struck the hill at a certain angle, and swept down by the cottage across the wintry plain, its voice was the most doleful that can be conceived ; it came as if the Past were speaking, as if the Dead had contributed each a whisper, as if the Desolation of Ages were breathed in that one lamenting sound. The Quaker at length closed the book, retaining however his hand between the pages which he had been reading, while he looked steadfastly at Pearson. The attitude and features of the latter might have in- dicated the endurance of bodily pain; he leaned his forehead on his hands, his teeth were firmly closed, and his frame was tremulous at intervals with a ner- vous agitation. ‘Friend Tobias,’ inquired the old man, compassion- ately, ‘hast thou found no comfort in these many blessed passages of Scripture ?’ ‘ Thy voice has fallen on my ear like a sound afar off and indistinct,’ replied Pearson without lifting his eyes. ‘ Yea, and when I have hearkened carefully, the words seemed cold and lifeless, and intended for another and a lesser grief than mine. Remove the book,’ he added, in atone of sullen bitterness. ‘I THE GENTLE BOY. 123 have no part in its consolations, and they do but fret my sorrow the more.’ ‘Nay, feeble brother, be not as one who hath never known the light,’ said the elder Quaker, earnestly, but with mildness. ‘Art thou he that wouldst be content to give all, and endure all, for conscience’ sake ; de- siring even peculiar trials, that thy faith might be puri- fied, and thy heart weaned from worldly desires And wilt thou sink beneath an affliction which happens alike to them that have their portion here below, and to them that lay up treasure in heaven? Faint not, for thy burthen is yet light.’ ‘It is heavy! It is heavier than I can bear!” ex- claimed Pearson, with the impatience of a variable spirit. ‘From my youth upward I have been a man marked out for wrath; and year by year, yea, day after day, I have endured sorrows, such as others know not in their life-time. And now I speak not of the love that has been turned to hatred, the honor to ignominy, the ease and plentifulness of all things to danger, want, and nakedness. All this I could have borne, and counted myself blessed. But when my heart was desolate with many losses, I fixed it upon the child of a stranger, and he became dearer to me than all my buried ones; and now he too must die as if my love were poison. Verily, I am an accursed man, and I will lay me down in the dust, and lift up my head no more.’ ‘Thou sinnest, brother, but it is not for me to re- buke thee; for I also have had my hours of darkness, wherein I have murmured against the cross,’ said the 124 THE GENTLE BOY. old Quaker. He continued, perhaps in the hope of distracting his companion’s thoughts from his own sorrows. ‘Even of late was the light obscured with- in me, when the men of blood had banished me on pain of death, and the constables led me onward from village to village, towards the wilderness. A strong and cruel hand was wielding the knotted cords; they sunk deep into the flesh, and thou mightst have track- ed every reel and totter of my footsteps by the blood that followed. As we went on’ — | ‘ Have I not borne all this; and have I murmured ?? interrupted Pearson, impatiently. ‘Nay, friend, but hear me,’ continued the other. ‘ As we journeyed on, night darkened on our path, so that no man could see the rage of the persecutors, or the constancy of my endurance, though, Heaven for- bid that I should glory therein. The lights began to glimmer in the cottage windows, and I could discern the inmates as they gathered, in comfort and security, every man with his wife and children by their own evening hearth. At length we came to a tract of fer- tile land; in the dim light, the forest was not visible around it; and behold! there was a straw-thatched dwelling, which bore the very aspect of my home, far over the wild ocean, far in our own England. Then came bitter thoughts upon me; yea, remem- brances that were like death to my soul. The happi- ness of my early days was painted to me; the dis- quiet of my manhood, the altered faith of my de- clining years. I remembered how I had been moved to go forth a wanderer, when my daughter, the young- THE GENTLE BOY. 125 est, the dearest of my flock, lay on her dying bed, and ’ — ‘Couldst thou obey the command at such a mo- ment?’ exclaimed Pearson, shuddering. ‘ Yea, yea,’ replied the old man, hurriedly. ‘I was kneeling by her bed-side when the voice spoke loud within me; but immediately I rose, and took my staff, and gat me gone. Oh! that it were permitted me to forget her woeful look, when I thus withdrew my arm, and left her journeying through the dark valley alone! for her soul was faint, and she had leaned upon my prayers. Now in that night of horror I was assailed by the thought that I had been an erring christian, and a cruel parent; yea, even my daughter, with her pale, dying features, seemed to stand by me and whisper, ‘‘ Father, you are deceived; go home and shelter your grey head.” Oh! thou, to whom I have looked in my farthest wanderings,’ continued the Quaker, raising his agitated eyes to heaven, ‘ inflict not upon the bloodiest of our persecutors the unmiti- gated agony of my soul, when I believed that all I had done and suffered for Thee was at the instigation of a mocking fiend! But I yielded not; I knelt down and wrestled with the tempter, while the scourge bit more fiercely into the flesh. My prayer was heard, and I went on in peace and joy towards the wilderness.’ The old man, though his fanaticism had generally all the calmness of reason, was deeply moved while reciting this tale ; and his unwonted emotion seemed to rebuke and keep down that of hiscompanion. They sat in silence, with their faces to the fire, imagining 126 THE GENTLE BOY. perhaps, in its red embers, new scenes of persecution yet to be encountered. ‘The snow still drifted hard against the windows, and\sometimes, as the blaze of the logs had gradually sunk, came down the spacious chimney and hissed upon the hearth. A cautious footstep might now and then be heard in a neighboring apartment, and the sound invariably drew the eyes of both Quakers to the door which led thither. ‘When a fierce and riotous gust of wind had led his thoughts, by a natural association, to homeless travellers on such a night, Pearson resumed the conversation. ‘T have well nigh sunk under my own share of this trial,’ observed he, sighing heavily ; ‘ yet I would that it might be doubled to me, if so the child’s mother could be spared. Her wounds have been deep and many, but this will be the sorest of all.’ ‘Fear not for Catharine,’ replied the old Quaker ; ‘for | know that valiant woman, and have seen how she can bear the cross. A mother’s heart, indeed, is strong in her, and may seem to contend mightily with her faith ; but soon she will stand up and give thanks that her son has been thus early an accepted sacri- fice. The boy hath done his work, and she will feel that he is taken hence in kindness both to him and her. Blessed, blessed are they, that with so little suf- fering can enter into peace !” The fitful rush of the wind was now disturbed by a portentous sound ; it was a quick and heavy knocking at the outer door. Pearson’s wan countenance grew paler, for many a visit of persecution had taught him what to dread ; the old man, on the other hand, stood THE GENTLE BOY. 127 up erect, and his glance was firm as that of the tried soldier who awaits his enemy. ‘The men of blood have come to seek me,’ he observed, with calmness. ‘They have heard how I was moved to return from banishment; and now am I to be led to prison, and thence to death. Itis an end I have long looked for. I will open unto them, lest they say, “‘ Lo, he feareth!”” ‘Nay, I will present myself before them,’ said Pearson, with recovered fortitude. ‘It may be that they seek me alone, and know not that thou abidest with me.’ ‘Let us go boldly, both one and the other,’ re- joined his companion. ‘It is not fitting that thou or I should shrink.’ They therefore proceeded through the entry to the door, which they opened, bidding the applicant ‘Come in, in God’s name!’ A furious blast of wind drove the storm into their faces, and extinguished the lamp; they had barely time to discern a figure, so white from head to foot with the drifted snow, that it seemed like Winter’s self, come in human shape to seek refuge from its own desolation. ‘Enter, friend, and do thy errand, be it what it may,’ said Pearson. ‘It must needs be pressing, since thou comest on such a bitter night.’ ‘Peace be with this household,’ said the stranger, when they stood on the floor of the inner apartment. Pearson started, the elder Quaker stirred the slum- bering embers of the fire, till they sent up ‘a clear and lofty blaze; it was a female voice that had 128 THE GENTLE BOY. spoken; it was a female form that shone out, cold and wintry, in that comfortable light. ‘Catharine, blessed woman,’ exclaimed the old man, ‘art thou come to this darkened land again! art thou come to bear a valiant testimony as in former years? The scourge hath not prevailed against thee, and from the dungeon hast thou come forth triumphant; but strengthen, strengthen now thy heart, Catharine, for Heaven will prove thee yet this once, ere thou go to thy reward.’ | ‘ Rejoice, friends!’ she replied. ‘' Thou who hast long been of our people, and thou whom a little child hath led to us, rejoice! Lo! I come, the messenger of glad tidings, for the day of persecution is over- past. The heart of the king, even Charles, hath been moved in gentleness towards us, and he hath sent forth his letters to stay the hands of the men of blood. A ship’s company of our friends hath arrived at yonder town, and I also sailed joyfully among them.’ As Catharine spoke, her eyes were roaming about the room, in search of him for whose sake security was dear to her. Pearson made a silent appeal to the old man, nor did the latter shrink from the pain- ful task assigned him. ‘ Sister,’ he began, in a softened yet perfectly calm tone, ‘ thou tellest us of His love, manifested in tem- poral good ; and now must we speak to thee of that self-same love, displayed in chastenings. Hitherto, Catharine, thou hast been as one journeying in a dark- some and difficult path, and leading an infant by the THE GENTLE BOY. 129 hand; fain wouldst thou have looked heavenward continually, but still the cares of that little child have drawn thine eyes, and thy affections, to the earth. Sister! go on rejoicing, for his tottering footsteps shall impede thine own no more.” But the unhappy mother was not thus to be con- soled ; she shook like a leaf, she turned white as the very snow that hung drifted into her hair. The firm old man extended his hand and held her up, keeping his eye upon hers, as if to repress any outbreak of passion. ‘IT am a woman, I am but a woman; will He try me above my strength ?’ said Catharine, very quickly, and almost in a whisper. ‘I have been wounded sore; I have suffered much ; many things in the body, many in the mind ; crucified in myself, and in them that were dearest to me. Surely,’ added she, with a long shudder, ‘ He hath spared me in this one thing.’ She broke forth with sudden and irrepressible vio- lence. ‘Tell me, man of cold heart, what has God done tome? Hath He cast me down never to rise again? Hath He crushed my very heart in his hand? And thou, to whom I committed my child, how hast thou fulfilled thy trust? Give me back the boy, well, sound, alive, alive ; or earth and heaven shall avenge me!’ The agonized shriek of Catharine was answered by the faint, the very faint voice of a child. On this day it had become evident to Pearson, to his aged guest, and to Dorothy, that Ilbrahim’s brief and troubled pilgrimage drew near its close. The VOL. I. 9 1380 THE GENTLE BOY. two former would willingly have remained by him, to make use of the prayers and pious discourses which they deemed appropriate to the time, and which, if they be impotent as to the departing traveller’s recep- tion in the world whither he goes, may at least sus- tain him in bidding adieu to earth. But though II- brahim uttered no complaint, he was disturbed by the faces that looked upon him; so that Dorothy’s entrea- ties, and their own conviction that the child’s feet might tread heaven’s pavement and not soil it, had induced the two Quakers to remove. Ibrahim then closed his eyes and grew calm, and, except for now and then, a kind and low word to his nurse, might have been thought to slumber. As night-fall came on, however, and the storm began to rise, something seemed to trouble the repose of the boy’s mind, and to render his sense of hearing active and acute. Ifa passing wind lingered to shake the casement, he strove to turn his head towards it; if the door jarred to and fro’ upon its hinges, he looked long and anxiously thitherward ; if the heavy voice of the old. man, as he read the scriptures, rose but a little higher, the child almost held his dying breath to listen ; if a snow-drift swept by the cottage, with a sound like the trailing of a garment, Ilbrahim seemed to watch that some visitant should enter. But, after a little time, he relinquished whatever secret hope had agitated him, and, with one low, com- plaining whisper, turned his cheek upon the pillow. He then addressed Dorothy with his usual sweetness, and besought her to draw near him ; she did so, and THE GENTLE BOY. 131 Ilbrahim took her hand in both of his, grasping it with a gentle pressure, as if to assure himself that he retained it. At intervals, and without disturbing the repose of his countenance, a very faint trembling passed over him from head to foot, as if a mild but somewhat cool wind had breathed upon him, and made him shiver. As the boy thus led her by the hand, in his quiet progress over the borders of eter- nity, Dorothy almost imagined that she could discern the near, though dim delightfulness, of the home he was about to reach; she would not have enticed the little wanderer back, though she bemoaned herself that she must leave him and return. But just when Ilbrahim’s feet were pressing on the soil of Paradise, he heard a voice behind him, and it recalled him a few, few paces of the weary path which he had tra- velled. As Dorothy looked upon his features, she perceived that their placid expression was again dis- turbed ; her own thoughts had been so wrapped in him, that all sounds of the storm, and of human speech, were lost to her; but when Catharine’s shriek pierced through the room, the igi strove to raise himself. ‘Friend, she is come! Open unto her!’ cried he. In a moment, his mother was kneeling by the bed- side ; she drew Ilbrahim to her bosom, and he nestled there, with no violence of joy, but contentedly as if he were hushing himself to sleep. He looked into her face, and reading its agony, said, with feeble ear- nestness, 182 THE GENTLE BOY. ‘Mourn not, dearest mother. I am happy now.’ And with these words, the gentle boy was dead. * % % % * The king’s mandate to stay the New England per- secutors was effectual in preventing further martyr: doms; but the colonial authorities, trusting in the remoteness of their situation, and perhaps in the sup- posed instability of the royal government, shortly re- newed their severities in all other respects. Catha- rine’s fanaticism had become wilder by the sundering of all human ties; and wherever a scourge was lift- ed, there was she to receive the blow ; and whenever a dungeon was unbarred, thither she came, to cast herself upon the floor. But in process of time, a more christian spirit—a spirit of forbearance, though not of cordiality or approbation, began to pervade the land in regard to the persecuted sect. And then, when the rigid old Pilgrims eyed her rather in pity than in wrath; when the matrons fed her with the fragments of their children’s food, and offered her a lodging on a hard and lowly bed; when no little crowd of school-boys left their sports to cast stones after the roving enthusiast ; then did Catharine return to Pearson’s dwelling, and made that her home. As if Ilbrahim’s sweetness yet lingered round his ashes ; as if his gentle spirit came down from heaven to teach his parent a true religion, her fierce and vin- dictive nature was softened by the same griefs which had once irritated it. When the course of years had made the features ofthe unobtrusive mourner familiar THE GENTLE BOY. 133 in the settlement, she became a subject of not deep, but general interest ; a being on whom the otherwise superfluous sympathies of all might be bestowed. Every one spoke of her with that degree of pity which it is pleasant to experience ; every one was ready to do her the little kindnesses, which are not costly, yet manifest good will; and when at last she died, a long train of her once bitter persecutors followed her, with decent sadness and tears that were not painful, to her place by Ilbrahim’s green and sunken grave. Be, he ~ snieenaatto eld Tra Sia sats 2 am | iat ; oF ve MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. i tA, MST MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. A youne fellow, a tobacco-pedler by trade, was on his way from Morristown, where he had dealt largely with the Deacon of the Shaker settlement, to the vil- lage of Parker’s Falls, on Salmon River. He had a neat little cart, painted green, with a box of cigars depicted on each side-panel, and an Indian chief, holding a pipe and a golden, tobacco-stalk, on the rear. The pedler drove a smart little mare, and was a young man of excellent character, keen at a bar- gain, but none the worse liked by the Yankees; who, as I have heard them say, would rather be shaved with a-sharp razor than a dull one. Especially was he beloved by the pretty girls along the Connecticut, whose favor he used to court by presents of the best smoking tobacco in his stock ; knowing well that the country lasses of New England are generally great 138 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. performers on pipes. Moreover, as will be seen in the course of my story, the pedler was inquisitive, and something of a tattler, always itching to hear the news and anxious to tell it again. After an early breakfast at Morristown, the tobac- co pedler, whose name was Dominicus Pike, had travelled seven miles through a solitary piece of woods, without speaking a word to any body but him- self and his little grey mare. It being nearly seven o’clock, he was as eager to hold a morning gossip, as a city shopkeeper to read the morning paper. An opportunity seemed at hand, when after lighting a cigar with a sun-glass, he looked up, and perceived a man coming over the brow of the hill, at the foot of which the pedler had stopped his green cart. Do- minicus watched him as he descended, and noticed that he carried a bundle over his shoulder on the end of a stick, and travelled with a weary, yet determined pace. He did not look as if he had started in the freshness of the morning, but had footed it all night, and meant to do the same all day. ‘Good morning, mister,’ said Dominicus, when within speaking distance. ‘ You go a pretty good jog. Whats the latest news at Parker’s Falls ?’ The man pulled the broad brim of a gray hat over his eyes, and answered, rather sullenly, that he did not come from Parker’s Falls, which, as being the limit of his own day’s journey, the pedler had natu- rally mentioned in his inquiry. ‘Well, then,’ rejoined Dominicus Pike, ‘ let’s have the latest news where you did come from. I’m not MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 139 particular about Parker’s Falls. Any place will answer.’ Being thus importuned, the traveller — who was as ill-looking a fellow as one would desire to meet, in a solitary piece of woods — appeared to hesitate a little, as if he was either searching his memory for news, or weighing the expediency of telling it. At last mounting on the step of the cart, he whispered in the ear of Dominicus, though he might have shouted aloud, and no other mortal would have heard him. ‘I do remember one little trifle of news,’ said he. ‘Old Mr. Higginbotham, of Kimballton, was murder- ed in his orchard, at eight o’clock last night, by an Irishman and a nigger. They strung him up to the branch of a St. Michel’s pear tree, where nobody would find him till the morning.’ As soon as this horrible intelligence was commu- nicated, the stranger betook himself to his journey again, with more speed than ever, not even turning his head when Dominicus invited him to smoke a Spanish cigar and relate all the particulars. ‘The pedler whistled to his mare and went up the hill, pondering on the doleful fate of Mr. Higginbotham, whom he had known in the way of trade, having sold him many a bunch of long nines, and a great deal of pig-tail, lady’s twist, and fig tobacco. He was rather astonished at the rapidity with which the news had spread. Kimballton was nearly sixty miles distant in a straight line; the murder had been perpetrated only at eight o’clock the preceding night; yet Do- minicus had heard of it at seven in the morning, 140 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. when, in all probability, poor Mr. Higginbotham’s own family had but just discovered his corpse, hang- ing on the St. Micheel’s pear tree. The stranger on foot must have worn seven-league boots, to travel at such a rate. ‘Jll news flies fast, they say,’ thought Dominicus Pike ; ‘ but this beats railroads. The fellow ought to be hired to go express with the President’s Mes- sage.’ The difficulty was solved, by supposing that the narrator had made a mistake of one day, in the date of the occurrence ; so that our friend did not hesitate to introduce the story atevery tavern and country store along the road, expending a whole bunch of Spanish wrappers among at least twenty horrified audiences. He found himself invariably the first bearer of the intelligence, and was so pestered with questions that he could not avoid filling up the outline, till it became: quite a respectable narrative. He met with one piece of corroborative evidence. Mr. Higginbotham was a trader ; and a former clerk of his to whom Dominicus related the facts, testified that the old gentleman was accustomed to return home through the orchard, about night-fall, with the money and valuable papers of the store in his pocket. The clerk manifested but little grief at Mr. Higginbotham’s catastrophe, hinting, what the pedler had discovered in his own dealings with him, that he was a crusty old fellow, as close as a vise. His property would descend to a pretty niece who was now keeping school in Kimballton. What with telling the news for the public good, and MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 141 driving bargains for his own, Dominicus was so much delayed on the road, that he chose to put up at a tavern, about five miles short of Parker’s Falls. After supper, lighting one of his prime cigars, he seated himself in the bar-room, and went through the story of the murder, which had grown so fast that it took him half an hour to tell. There were as many as twenty people in the room, nineteen of whom received it all for gospel. But the twentieth was an elderly farmer, who had arrived on horseback a short time before, and was now seated in a corner, smoking his pipe. When the story was concluded, he rose up very deliberately, brought his chair right in front of Dominicus, and stared him full in the face, puffing out’ the vilest tobacco smoke the pedler had ever smelt. | ‘Will you make affidavit,’ demanded he, in the tone of a country justice taking an examination, ‘ that old Squire Higginbotham of Kimballton was murder- ed in his orchard the night before last, and found hanging on his great pear tree yesterday morning ?? ‘I tell the story as I heard it, mister,’ answered Dominicus, dropping his half-burnt cigar; ‘I don’t say that I saw the thing done. So I can’t take my oath that he was murdered exactly in that way.’ ‘But I can take mine,’ said the farmer, ‘ that if Squire Higginbotham was murdered night before last, I drank a glass of bitters with his ghost this morning. Being a neighbor of mine, he called me into his store, as I was riding by, and treated me, and then asked me to do a little business for him on the road. He 142 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. did’nt seem to know any more about his own murder than I did.’ ‘ Why, then it can’t be a fact!’ exclaimed Domini- cus Pike. ‘I guess he’ d have mentioned, if it was,’ said the old farmer; and he removed his chair back to the corner, leaving Dominicus quite down in the mouth. Here was a sad resurrection of old Mr. Higgin- botham! The pedler had no heart to mingle in the conversation any more, but comforted himself with a glass of gin and water, and went to bed, where, all night long, he dreamt of hanging on the St. Micheel’s pear tree. To avoid the old farmer (whom he so detested, that his suspension would have pleased him better than Mr. Higginbotham’s), Dominicus rose in the gray of the morning, put the little mare into the green cart, and trotted swiftly away towards Parker’s Falls. The fresh breeze, the dewy road, and the pleasant summer dawn, revived his spirits, and might have encouraged him to repeat the old story, had there been any body awake to hear it. But he met neither ox-team, light wagon, chaise, horseman, nor foot-traveller, till just as he crossed Salmon River, a man came trudging down to the bridge with a bundle over his shoulder, on the end of a stick. ‘Good morning, mister,’ said the pedler, reining in his mare. ‘If you come from Kimballton or that neighborhood, may be you can tell me the real fact about this affair of old Mr. Higginbotham. Was the old fellow actually murdered two or three nights ago, by an Irishman anda nigger ?’ MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 143 Dominicus had spoken in too great a hurry to ob- serve at first, that the stranger himself had a deep tinge of negro blood. On hearing this sudden ques- tion, the Ethiopian appeared to change his skin, its yellow hue becoming a ghastly white, while, shaking and stammering, he thus replied : — ‘No! no! There was no colored man! It was an Irishman that hanged him last night, at eight o'clock. I came away at seven! His folks can’t have looked for him in the orchard yet.’ Scarcely had the yellow man spoken, when he interrupted himself, and though he seemed weary enough before, continued his journey at a pace, which would have kept the pedler’s mare on a smart trot. Dominicus stared after him in great perplexity. If the murder had not been committed till Tuesday night, who was the prophet that had foretold it, in all its circumstances, on Tuesday morning? If Mr. Higginbotham’s corpse were not yet discovered by his own family, how came the mulatto, at above thirty miles distance, to know that he was hanging in the orchard, especially as he had left Kimballton be- fore the unfortunate man was hanged at all. These ambiguous circumstances, with the stranger’s sur- prise and terror, made Dominicus think of raising a hue and cry after him, as an accomplice in the mur- der; since a murder, it seemed, had really been perpetrated. ‘ But let the poor devil go,’ thought the pedler. ‘I don’t want his black blood on my head; and hanging the nigger wouldn’t unhang Mr. Higginbotham. Un- 144 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. hang the old gentleman! It’s a sin, I know; but I should hate to have him come to life a second time, and give me the lie!” With these meditations, Dominicus Pike drove into the street of Parker’s Falls, which, as every body ‘knows, is as thriving a village as three cotton factories and a slitting mill can make it. ‘The machinery was not in motion, and but a few of the shop doors un- barred, when he alighted in the stable yard of the tav- ern, and made it his first business to order the mare four quarts of oats. His second duty, of course, was to impart Mr. Higginbotham’s catastrophe to the ostler. He deemed it advisable, however, not to be too posi- tive as to the date of the direful fact, and also to be uncertain whether it were perpetrated by an Irishman and a mulatto, or by the son of Erin alone. Neither did he profess to relate it on his own authority, or that of any one person; but mentioned it as a report generally diffused. The story ran through the town like fire among girdled trees, and became so much the universal talk, that nobody could tell whence it had originated. Mr. Higginbotham was as well known at Parker’s Falls as any citizen of the place, being part owner of the slitting mill, and a considerable stockholder in the cotton factories. The inhabitants felt their own pros- perity interested in his fate. Such was the excite- ment, that the Parker’s Falls Gazette anticipated its regular day of publication, and came out with half a form of blank paper anda column of double pica em- phasized with capitals, and headed HORRID MUR- MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 145 DER OF MR. HIGGINBOTHAM! Among other dreadful details, the printed account described the mark of the cord round the dead man’s neck, and stated the number of thousand dollars of which he had been robbed; there was much pathos also about the affliction of his niece, who had gone from one fainting fit to another, ever since her uncle was found hanging on the St. Micheel’s pear tree with his pock- ets inside out. The village poet likewise commemo- rated the young lady’s grief in seventeen stanzas of a ballad. The selectmen held a meeting, and in con- sideration of Mr. Higginbotham’s claims on the town, determined to issue handbills, offering a reward of five hundred dollars for the apprehension of his mur- derers, and the recovery of the stolen property. Meanwhile, the whole population of Parker’s Falls, consisting of shopkeepers, mistresses of boarding houses, factory girls, millmen, and schoolboys, rushed into the street and kept up such a terrible loquacity, as more than compensated for the silence of the cot- ton machines, which refrained from their usual din out of respect to the deceased. Had Mr. Higgin- botham cared about posthumous renown, his untimely ghost would have exulted in this tumult. Our friend Dominicus, in his vanity of heart, forgot his intended precautions, and mounting on the town pump, an- nounced himself as the bearer of the authentic intel- ligence which had caused so wonderful a sensation. He immediately became the great man of the mo- ment, and had just begun a new edition of the nar- rative, with a voice like a field preacher, when the VOL. 1. 10 146 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. mail stage drove into the village street. It had travelled all night, and must have shifted horses at Kimballton, at three in the morning. ‘Now we shall hear all the particulars,’ shouted the crowd. : The coach rumbled up to the piazza of the tavern, followed by a thousand people; for if any man had been minding his own business till then, he now left it at sixes and sevens, to hear the news. The pedler, foremost in the race, discovered two passengers, both of whom had been startled from a comfortable nap ~ to find themselves in the centre of a mob. Every man assailing them with separate questions, all pro- pounded at once, the couple were struck speechless, though one was a lawyer and the other a young lady. ‘Mr. Higginbotham! Mr. Higginbotham! Tell us the particulars about old Mr. Higginbotham !’ bawled the mob. ‘ What is the coroner’s verdict? Are the murderers apprehended? Is Mr. Higginbotham’s niece come out of her fainting fits? Mr. Higginbo- tham! Mr. Higginbotham ! !’ The coachman said not a word, except to swear awfully at the ostler for not bringing him a fresh team of horses. The lawyer inside had generally his wits about him even when asleep; the first thing he did, afier learning the cause of the excitement, was to pro- duce a large red pocket-book. Meantime, Domini- cus Pike, being an extremely polite young man, and also suspecting that a female tongue would tell the story as glibly as a lawyer’s, had handed the lady out MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 147 of the coach. She was a fine, smart girl, now wide awake and bright as a button, and had such a sweet pretty mouth, that Dominicus would almost as lief have heard a love tale from it as a tale of murder. ‘Gentlemen and ladies; said the lawyer, to the shopkeepers, the millmen, and the factory girls, ‘1 can assure you that some unaccountable mistake, or, more probably, a wilful falsehood, maliciously con- trived to injure Mr. Higginbotham’s credit, has excited . this singular uproar. We’passed through Kimballton at three o’clock this morning, and most certainly should have been informed of the murder, had any been perpetrated. But I have proof nearly as strong as Mr. Higginbotham’s own oral testimony, in the negative. Here is a note, relating to a suit of his in the Connecticut courts, which was delivered me from that gentleman himself. I find it dated at ten o’clock last evening.’ So saying, the lawyer exhibited the date and sig- nature of the note, which irrefragably proved, either that this perverse Mr. Higginbotham was alive when he wrote it, or,—as some deemed the more proba- ble case, of two doubtful ones, — that he was so ab- sorbed in worldly business as to continue to transact it, even after his death. But unexpected evidence was forthcoming. The young lady, after listening to the pedler’s explanation, merely seized a moment to smooth her gown and put her curls in order, and then appeared at the tavern door, making a modest signal to be heard. ‘Good people,’ said she, ‘I am Mr. Higginbotham’s niece.’ 148 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. A wondering murmur passed through the crowd, on beholding her so rosy and bright; that same un- happy niece, whom they had supposed, on the au- thority of the Parker’s Falls Gazette, to be lying at death’s door in a fainting fit. But some shrewd fel- lows had doubted, all along, whether a young lady would be quite so desperate at the hanging of a rich old uncle. ; ‘You see,’ continued Miss Higginbotham, with a smile, ‘that this strange story is quite unfounded, as to myself; and I believe I may affirm it to be equally so, in regard to my dear uncle Higginbotham. He has the kindness to give me a home in his house, though I contribute to my own support by teaching a school. I left Kimballton this morning to spend the vacation of commencement week with a friend, about five miles from Parker’s Falls. My generous uncle, when he heard me on the stairs, called me to his bed-side, and gave me two dollars and fifty cents, to pay my stage fare, and another dollar for my extra expenses. He then laid his pocket-book under his pillow, shook hands with me, and advised me to take some biscuit in my bag, instead of breakfasting on the road. 1 feel confident, therefore, that I left my beloved relative alive, and trust that I shall find him so on my return.’ The young lady courtsied at the close of her speech, which was so sensible, and well-worded, and delivered with such grace and propriety, that every body thought her fit to be Preceptress of the best Academy in the State. Buta stranger would have MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 149 supposed that Mr. Higginbotham was an object of abhorrence at Parker’s Falls, and that a thanksgiving had been proclaimed for his murder; so excessive was the wrath of the inhabitants, on learning their mistake, The millmenoresolved to bestow public honors on Dominicus Pike, only hesitating whether to tar and feather him, ride him on a rail, or refresh him with an ablution at the town pump, on the top of which he had declared himself the bearer of the news. The selectmen, by advice of the lawyer, spoke of prosecuting him for a misdemeanor, in cir- culating unfounded reports, to the great disturbance of the peace of the commonwealth. Nothing saved Dominicus, either from mob-law or a court of justice, but an eloquent appeal made by the young lady in his behalf. Addressing a few words of heartfelt gratitude to his benefactress, he mounted the green cart and rode out of town, under a discharge of ar- tillery from the schoolboys, who found plenty of am- munition in the neighboring clay-pits and mud-holes. As he turned his head, to exchange a farewell glance with Mr. Higginbotham’s niece, a ball, of the consist- ence of hasty-pudding, hit him slap in the mouth, giving him a most grim aspect. His whole person was so bespattered with the like filthy missiles, that he had almost a mind to ride back, and supplicate for the threatened ablution at the town pump ; for, though not meant in kindness, it would now have been a deed of charity. However, the sun shone bright on poor Dominicus, and the mud, an emblem of all stains of undeserved é 150 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. opprobrium, was easily brushed off when dry. Be- ing a funny rogue, his heart soon cheered up; nor could he refrain from a hearty laugh at the uproar which his story had excited. The handbills of the selectmen would cause the commitment of all the vagabonds in the State; the paragraph in the Park- er’s Falls Gazette would be reprinted from Maine to Florida, and perhaps form an item in the London newspapers; and many a miser would tremble for his money-bags and life, on learning the catastrophe of Mr. Higginbotham. The pedler meditated with much fervor on the charms of the young schoolmis- tress, and swore that Daniel Webster never spoke nor looked so like an angel as Miss Higginbotham, while defending him from the wrathful populace at Parker’s Falls. | Dominicus was now on the Kimballton turnpike, having all along determined to visit that place, though business had drawn him out of the most direct road from Morristown. As he approached the scene of the supposed murder, he continued to revolve the circum- stances in his mind, and was astonished at the aspect which the whole case assumed. Had nothing oc- curred to corroborate the story of the first traveller, it might now have been considered as a hoax; but the yellow man was evidently acquainted either with the report or the fact; and there was a mystery in his dismayed and guilty look on being abruptly ques- tioned. When, to this singular combination of inci- dents, it was added that the rumor tallied exactly with Mr. Higginbotham’s character and habits of life ; and MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 151 that he had an orchard, and a St. Michel’s pear tree, near which he always passed at night-fall; the circumstantial evidence appeared so strong that Do- minicus doubted whether the autograph produced by the lawyer, or even the niece’s direct testimony, ought to be equivalent. Making cautious inquiries along the road, the pedler further learned that Mr. Higginbotham had in his service an Irishman of doubtful character, whom he had hired without a re- commendation, on the score of economy. ‘May I be hanged myself, exclaimed Dominicus Pike aloud, on reaching the top of a lonely hill, ‘if I'll believe old Higginbotham is unhanged, till I see him with my own eyes, and hear it from his own mouth! Andas he’s a real shaver, 1’ll have the minister or some other responsible man, for an en- dorser.’ It was growing dusk when he reached the toll- house on Kimballton turnpike, about a quarter of a mile from the village of this name. His little mare was fast bringing him up with a man on horseback, who trotted through the gate a few rods in advance of him, nodded to the toll-gatherer, and kept on towards the village. Dominicus was acquainted with the toll-man, and while making change, the usual remarks on the weather passed between them. ‘I suppose, said the pedler, throwing back his whiplash, to bring it down like a feather on the mare’s flank, ‘you have not seen anything of old Mr. Higginbotham within a day or two?’ ‘Yes,’ answered the toll-gatherer. ‘He passed the 152 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. gate just before you drove up, and yonder he rides now, if you can see him through the dusk. He’s been to Woodfield this afternoon, attending a sheriff’s sale there. The old man generally shakes hands and has a little chat with me ; but to-night, he nodded, — as if to say, “charge my toll,” —and jogged on; for wherever he goes, he must always be at home by eight o’clock.’ ‘So they tell me,’ said Dominicus. ‘] never saw a man look so yellow and thin as the squire does,’ continued the toll-gatherer. ‘Says I to myself, to-night, he’s more like a ghost or an old mummy than good flesh and blood.’ The pedler strained his eyes through the twilight, and could just discern the horseman now far ahead on the village road. He seemed to recognise the rear of Mr. Higginbotham ; but through the evening shadows, and amid the dust from the horse’s feet the figure appeared dim and unsubstantial; as if the shape of the mysterious old man were faintly moulded of darkness and gray light. Dominicus shivered. ‘Mr. Higginbotham has come back from the other world, by way of the Kimballton turnpike,’ thought he. ‘ He shook the reins and rode forward, keeping about the same distance in the rear of the gray old shadow, till the latter was concealed by a bend of the road. On reaching this point the pedler no longer saw the man on horseback, but found himself at the head of the village street, not far from a number of stores and two taverns, clustered round the meeting-house stee- MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. 153 ple. On his left was a stone wall and a gate, the boundary of a wood-lot, beyond which lay an or- chard, further still, a mowing-field, and last of all, a house. These were the premises of Mr. Higgin- botham, whose dwelling stood beside the old highway, but had been left in the back ground by the Kimball- ton turnpike. Dominicus knew the place; and the little mare stopped short by instinct ; for he was not conscious of tightening the reins. ‘For the soul of me, I cannot get by this gate !’ said he, trembling. ‘I never shall be my own man again, till I see whether Mr. Higginbotham is hang- ing on the St. Michzel’s pear tree !” He leaped from the cart, gave the rein a turn round the gate post, and ran along the green path of the wood-lot, as if Old Nick were chasing behind. Just then the village clock tolled eight, and as each deep stroke fell, Dominicus gave a fresh bound and flew faster than before, till, dim in the solitary centre of the orchard, he saw the fated pear tree. One great branch stretched from the old contorted trunk across the path, and threw the darkest shadow on that one spot. But something seemed to struggle beneath the branch ! The pedler had never pretended to more courage than befits a man of peaceable occupation, nor could he account for his valor on this awful emergency. Certain it is, however, that he rushed forward, pros- trated a sturdy Irishman with the but-end of his whip, and found not indeed hanging on the St. Mi- cheel’s pear tree, but. trembling beneath it, with a 154 MR. HIGGINBOTHAM’S CATASTROPHE. _halter round his neck — the old, identical Mr. Hig- ginbotham ! ‘Mr. Higginbotham,’ said Dominicus tremulously, ‘you ’re an honest man, and [Il take your word for it. Have you been hanged, or not?’ If the riddle be not already guessed, a few words will explain the simple machinery, by which this ‘ coming event’ was made to cast its shadow before.’ Three men had plotted the robbery and murder of Mr. Higginbotham ; two of them, successively, lost courage and fled, each delaying the crime one night, by their disappearance ; the third was in the act of perpetration, when a champion, blindly obeying the call of fate, like the heroes of old romance, appeared in the person of Dominicus Pike. . It only remains to say, that Mr. Higginbotham took the pedler into high favor, sanctioned his addresses to the pretty schoolmistress, and settled his whole property on their children, allowing themselves the interest. In due time, the old gentleman capped the climax of his favors, by dying a Christian death, in bed, since which melancholy event, Dominicus Pike | has removed from Kimballton, and established a 7 tobacco manufactory in my native village. | LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. Dine-pone! Ding-dong! Ding-dong ! The town-crier has rung his bell, at a distant cor- ner, and little Annie stands on her father’s door-steps, trying to hear what the man with the loud voice is talking about. Let me listen too. Oh! he is telling the people that an elephant, and a lion, and a royal tiger, and a horse with horns, and other strange beasts from foreign countries, have come to town, and will receive all visiters who choose to wait upon them. Perhaps little Annie would like to go. Yes; and I can see that the pretty child is weary of this wide and pleasant street, with the green trees fling- ing their shade across the quiet sunshine, and the pavements and the sidewalks all as clean as if the housemaid had just swept them with her broom. She feels that impulse to go strolling away —that 158 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. longing after the mystery of the great world — which many children feel, and which I felt in my child- hood. Little Annie shall take a ramble with me. See! I do but hold out my hand, and, like some bright bird in the sunny air, with her blue silk frock fluttering upwards from her white pantalets, she comes bounding on tiptoe across the street. Smooth back your brown curls, Annie; and let me tie on your bonnet, and we will set forth! What a strange couple to go on their rambles together! One walks in black attire, with a measured step, and a heavy brow, and his thoughtful eyes bent down, while the gay little girl trips lightly along, as if she were forced to keep hold of my hand, lest her feet should dance away from the earth. Yet there is sympathy between us. If I pride myself on anything, it is be- cause I have a smile that children love; and, on the other hand, there are few grown ladies that could entice me from the side of little Annie ; for I delight to let my mind go hand in hand - with the mind of a sinless child. So, come, Annie; but if I moralize as we go, do not listen to me; only look about you, and be merry ! Now we turn the corner. Here are hacks with two horses, and stage-coaches with four, thundering to meet each other, and trucks and carts moving at a slower pace, being heavily laden with barrels from the wharves, and here are rattling gigs, which per- haps will be smashed to pieces before our eyes. Hitherward, also, comes a man trundling a wheelbar- row along the pavement. Is not little Annie afraid of LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. 159 such a tumult? No; she does not even shrink closer to my side, but passes on with fearless confidence, a happy child amidst a great throng of grown people, who pay the same reverence to her infancy, that they would to extreme old age. Nobody jostles her ; all turn aside to make way for little Annie ; and what is most singular, she appears conscious of her claim to such respect. Now her eyes brighten with pleasure ! A street musician has seated himself on the steps of yonder church, and pours forth his strains to the busy town, a melody that has gone astray among the tramp of footsteps, the buzz of voices, and the war of passing wheels. Who heeds the poor organ-grinder? None but myself and little Annie, whose feet begin to move in unison with the lively tune, as if she were loth that music should be wasted without a dance. But where would Annie find a partner? Some have the gout in their toes, or the rheumatism in their joints; some are stiff with age; some feeble with disease ; some are so lean that their bones would rattle, and others of such ponderous size that their agility would crack the flag- stones ; but many, many have leaden feet, because their hearts are far heavier than lead. It is a sad thought that I have chanced upon. What a company of dancers should we be! For I, too, am a gentle- man of sober footsteps, and therefore, little Annie, let us walk sedately on. It is a question with me, whether this giddy child, or my sage self, have most pleasure in looking at the shop-windows. We love the silks of sunny hue, that glow within the darkened premises of the spruce dry- 160 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. goods men; we are pleasantly dazaled by the bur- nished silver, and the chased gold, the rings of wed- lock and the costly love-ornaments, glistening at the window of the jeweller; but Annie, more than I, seeks for a glimpse of her passing figure in the dusty look- ing-glasses at the hardware stores. All that is bright and gay attracts us both. Here is a shop to which the recollections of my boyhood, as well as present partialities, give a pecu- liar magic. How delightful to let the fancy revel on the dainties of a confectioner; those pies, with such white and flaky paste, their contents being a mystery, whether rich mince, with whole plums intermixed, or piquant apple, delicately rose-flavored ; those cakes, heart-shaped or round, piled in a lofty pyramid ; those sweet little circlets, sweetly named kisses ; those dark majestic masses, fit to be bridal loaves at the wedding of an heiress, mountains in size, their summits deeply snow-covered with sugar! Then the mighty treasures of sugarplums, white, and crimson, and yellow, in large glass vases; and candy of all varieties; and those little cockles, or whatever they are called, much prized by children for their sweetness, and more for the mottos which they enclose, by love-sick maids and bachelors! Oh! my mouth waters, little Annie, and so doth yours; but we will not be tempted, except to an imaginary feast; so let us hasten onward, devour- ing the vision of a plum cake. Here are pleasures, as some people would say, of a more exalted kind, in the window of a bookseller. Is Annie a literary lady ? Yes; she is deeply read in LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. 161 Peter Parley’s tomes, and has an increasing love for fairy tales, though seldom met with now-a-days, and she will subscribe, next year, to the Juvenile Miscel- lany. But, truth to tell, she is apt to turn away from the printed page, and keep gazing at the pretty pic- tures, such as the gay-colored ones which make this shop-window the continual loitering place of children. What would Annie think, if, in the book which I mean to send her, on New Year’s day, she should find her sweet little self, bound up in silk or morocco with gilt edges, there to remain till she become a woman grown, with children of her own. to read about their mother’s childhood! That would be very queer. Little Annie is weary of pictures, and pulls me onward by the hand, till suddenly we pause at the most wondrous shop in all the town. Oh, my stars! Is this a toyshop, or is it fairy land? For here are gilded chariots, in which the king and queen of the fairies might ride side by side, while their courtiers, on these small horses, should gallop in triumphal pro- cession before and behind the royal pair. Here, too, are dishes of china ware, fit to be the dining set of those same princely personages, when they make a regal banquet in the stateliest hall of their palace, full five feet high, and behold their nobles feasting adown the long perspective of the table. Betwixt the king and queen should sit my little Annie, the prettiest fairy of them all. Here stands a turbaned Turk, threatening us with his sabre, like an ugly heathen as he is. And next a Chinese mandarine, who nods his head at Annie and myself. Here we may review a VOL. I. 11 162 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. whole army of horse and foot, in red and blue uni- forms, with drums, fifes, trumpets, and all kinds of noiseless music ; they have halted on the shelf of this window, after their weary march from Lilliput. But what cares Annie for soldiers? No conquering queen is she, neither a Semiramis nor a Catharine; her whole heart is set upon that doll, who gazes at us with such a fashionable stare. This is the little girl’s true plaything. Though made of wood, a doll is a vision- ary and ethereal personage, endowed by childish fancy with a peculiar life ; the mimic lady is a hero- ine of romance, an actor and a sufferer in a thousand shadowy scenes, the chief inhabitant of that wild world with which children ape the real one. Little ‘Annie does not understand what I am saying, but looks wishfully at the proud lady in the window. We will invite her home with us as we return. Mean- time, good-by, Dame Doll! A toy yourself, you look forth from your window upon many ladies that are also toys, though they walk and speak, and upona crowd in pursuit of toys, though they wear grave visages. Oh, with your never-closing eyes, had you but an intellect to moralize on all that flits before them, what a wise doll would you be! Come, little . Annie, we shall find toys enough, go where we may. Now we elbow our way among the throng again. It is curious, in the most crowded part of a town, to meet with living creatures that had their birthplace in some far solitude, but have acquired a second nature in the wilderness of men. Look up, Annie, at that canary bird, hanging out of the window in his cage. LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. 163 Poor little fellow! His golden feathers are all tar- nished in this smoky sunshine ; he would have glistened twice as brightly among the summer islands ; but still he has become a citizen in all his tastes and habits, and would not sing half so well without the uproar that drowns his music. What a pity that he does not know how miserable he is! There is a parrot, too, calling out, ‘ Pretty Poll! Pretty Poll!’ as we pass by. Foolish bird, to be talking about her prettiness to strangers, especially as she is not a pretty Poll, though gaudily dressed in green and yellow. If she had said ‘ pretty Annie,’ there would have been some sense in it. See that gray squirrel, at the door of the fruit-shop, whirling round and round so merrily within his wire wheel! Being condemned to the treadmill, he makes it an amusement. Admirable philosophy ! Here comes a big, rough dog, a countryman’s dog in search of his master ; smelling at every body’s heels, and touching little Annie’s hand with his cold nose, but hurrying away, though she would fain have patted him. Success to your search, Fidelity! And there sits a great yellow cat upon a window-sill, a very cor- pulent and comfortable cat, gazing at this transitory world, with owl’s eyes, and making pithy comments, doubtless, or what appear such, to the silly beast. Oh, sage puss, make room for me beside you, and we will be a pair of philosophers ! Here we see something to remind us of the town- crier, and his ding-dong-bell ! Look ! look at that great cloth spread out in the air, pictured all over with wild beasts, as if they had met together to choose a king, 164 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. according to their custom in the days of Msop. But they are choosing neither a king nora President ; else we should hear a most horrible snarling! ‘They have come from the deep woods, and the wild mountains, and the desert sands, and the polar snows, only to do homage to my little Annie. As we enteramong them, the great elephant makes us a bow, in the best style of elephantine courtesy, bending lowly down his mountain bulk, with trunk abased and leg thrust out behind. Annie returns the salute, much to the grati- fication of the elephant, who is certainly the best bred monster in the caravan. The lion and the lioness are busy with two beef bones. The royal tiger, the beautiful, the untamable, keeps pacing his narrow cage with a haughty step, unmindful of the specta- tors, or recalling the fierce deeds of his former life, when he was wont to leap forth upon such inferior animals, from the jungles of Bengal. Here we see the very same wolf — do not go near him, Annie !— the self-same wolf that devoured little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother. In the next cage, a hyena from Egypt, who has doubtless howled around the pyramids, and a black bear from our own forests, are fellow prisoners, and most excellent friends. Are there any two living creatures, who have so few sympathies that they cannot possibly be friends? Here sits a great. white bear, whom com- mon. observers would call a very stupid beast, though I perceive him to be only absorbed in contemplation ; he is thinking of his voyages on an iceberg, and ot his comfortable home in the vicinity of the north pole LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. 165 and of the little cubs whom he left rolling in the eter- nal snows. In fact, he is a bear of sentiment. But, oh, those unsentimental monkeys ! the ugly, grinning, aping, chattering, illnatured, mischievous and queer little brutes. Annie does not love the monkeys. Their ugliness shocks her pure, instinctive delicacy of taste, and makes her mind unquiet, because it bears a wild and dark resemblance to humanity. But here is a little pony, just big enough for Annie to ride, and round and round he gallops in a circle, keeping time with his trampling hoofs to a band of music. And here — with a laced coat and a cocked hat, and a riding whip in his hand, here comes a little gentleman, small enough to be king of the fairies, and ugly enough to be king of the gnomes, and takes a flying leap into the saddle. Merrily, merrily, plays the music, and merrily gallops the pony, and merrily rides the little old gentleman. Come, Annie, into the street again; perchance we may see monkeys on horseback there ! Mercy on us, what a noisy world we quiet people live in! Did Annie ever read the cries of London city? With what lusty lungs doth yonder man pro- claim that his wheelbarrow is full of lobsters! Here comes another mounted ona cart, and blowing a hoarse and dreadful blast from a tin horn, as much as to say ‘ fresh fish!’ And hark! a voice on high, like that of a muezzin from the summit of a mosque, an- nouncing that some chimney sweeper has emerged from smoke and soot, and darksome caverns, into the upper air. What cares the world for that? But, 166 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. well-a-day, we hear a shrill voice of affliction, the scream of a little child, rising louder with every repe- tition of that smart, sharp, slapping sound, produced by an open hand on tender flesh. Annie sympathizes, though without experience of such direful woe. Lo! the town-crier again, with some new secret for the public ear. Will he tell us of an auction, or of a lost pocketbook, or a show of beautiful wax figures, or of some monstrous beast more horrible than any in the caravan? I guess the latter. See how he uplifts the bell in his right hand, and shakes it slowly at first, then with a hurried motion, till the clapper seems to strike both sides at once, and the sounds are scattered forth in quick succession, far and near. Ding-dong! Ding-dong! Ding-dong! Now he raises his clear, loud voice, above all the din of the town ; it drowns the buzzing talk of many tongues, and draws each man’s mind from his own business ; it rolls up and down the echoing street, and ascends to the hushed chamber of the sick, and pene- trates downward to the cellar kitchen, where the hot cook turns from the fire to listen. Who, of all that address the public ear, whether in church, or court- house, or hall of state, has such an attentive audience as the town-crier! What saith the people’s orator ? ‘Strayed from her home, a LITTLE GIRL, of five years old, in a blue silk frock and white pantalets, with brown curling hair and hazel eyes. Whoever will bring her back to her afflicted mother —’ Stop, stop, town-crier! The lost is found. Oh, my pretty Annie, we forgot to tell your mother of our LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. 167 ramble, and she is in despair, and has sent the town- crier to bellow up and down the streets, affrighting old and young, for the loss of a little girl who has not once let go my hand? Well, let us hasten home- ward; and as we go, forget not to thank heaven, my Annie, that after wandering a little way into the world, you may return at the first summons, with an untainted and unwearied heart, and be a happy child again. But I have gone too far astray for the town- crier to call me back! Sweet has been the charm of childhood on my spirit, throughout my ramble with little Annie! Say not that it has been a waste of precious moments, an idle matter, a babble of childish talk, and a reverie of childish imaginations, about topics unworthy of a grown man’s notice. Has it been merely this? Not so; not so. They are not truly wise who would affirm it. As the pure breath of children revives the life of aged men, so is our moral nature revived by their free and simple thoughts, their native feeling, their airy mirth, for little cause or none, their grief, soon roused and soon allayed. ‘Their influence on us is at least reciprocal with ours on them. When our infancy is almost forgotten,and our boyhood long departed, though it seems but as yesterday ; when life settles darkly down upon us, and we doubt whether to call ourselves young any more, then it is good to steal away from the society of bearded men, and even of gentler woman,.and spend an hour or two with children. After drinking from those foun- tains of still fresh existence, we shall return into the 168 LITTLE ANNIE’S RAMBLE. crowd, as I do now, to struggle onward and do our part in life, perhaps as fervently as ever, but, for a time, with a kinder and purer heart, and a spirit more lightly wise. All this by thy sweet magic, dear little Annie ! WAKEFIELD. WAKEFIELD. In some old magazine or newspaper, I recollect a story, told as truth, of a man —let us call him Wake- field — who absented himself for a long time from his wife. The fact, thus abstractedly stated, is not very uncommon, nor — without a proper distinction of cir- cumstances — to be condemned either as naughty or nonsensical. Howbeit, this, though far from the most ageravated, is perhaps the strangest instance, on re- cord, of marital delinquency ; and, moreover, as re- markable a freak as may be found in the whole list of human oddities. The wedded couple lived in London. The man, under pretence of going a journey, took lodgings in the next street to his own house, and there, unheard of by his wife or friends, and without the shadow of a reason for such self-banishment, dwelt upwards of twenty years. During that period, 172 WAKEFIELD. he beheld his home every day, and frequently the forlorn Mrs. Wakefield. And after so great a gap in his matrimonial felicity — when his death was reck- oned certain, his estate settled, his name dismissed from memory, and his wife, long, long ago, resigned to her autumnal widowhood —he entered the door one evening, quietly, as from a day’s absence, and became a loving spouse till death. 7 This outline is all that I remember. But the inci- dent, though of the purest originality, unexampled, and probably never to be repeated, is one, I think, which appeals to the general sympathies of mankind. We know, each for himself, that none of us would perpetrate such a folly, yet feel as if some other might. To my own contemplations, at least, it has often recurred, always exciting wonder, but with a sense that the story must be true, and a conception of its hero’s character. Whenever any subject so forci- bly affects the mind, time is well spent in thinking of it. Ifthe reader choose, let him do his own medita- tion; or if he prefer to.ramble with me through the twenty years of Wakefield’s vagary, I bid him wel- come ; trusting that there will be a pervading spirit and a moral, even should we fail to find them, done up neatly, and condensed into the final sentence. Thought has always its efficacy, and every striking incident its moral. What sort of a man was Wakefield? We are fires to shape out our own idea, and call it by his name. He was now in the meridian of life ; his matrimonial affections, never violent, were sobered into a calm, WAKEFIELD. 173 habitual sentiment; of all husbands, he was likely to be the most constant, -because a certain sluggishness - would keep his heart at rest, wherever it might be placed. He was intellectual, but not actively so ; his mind occupied itself in long and lazy musings, that tended to no purpose, or had not vigor to attain it ; his thoughts were seldom so energetic as to seize hold of words. Imagination, in the proper meaning of the term, made no part of Wakefield’s gifts. With a cold, but not depraved nor wandering heart, and a mind never feverish with riotous thoughts, nor per- plexed with originality, who could have anticipated, that our friend would entitle himself to a foremost place among the doers of eccentric deeds? Had his acquaintances been asked, who was the man in Lon- don, the surest to perform nothing today which should be remembered on the morrow, they would have thought of Wakefield. Only the wife of his bosom might have hesitated. She, without having analyzed his character, was partly aware of a quiet selfishness, that had rusted into his inactive mind — of a peculiar sort of vanity, the most uneasy attribute about him — of a disposition to craft, which had seldom produced more positive effects than the keeping of petty secrets, hardly worth revealing —and, lastly, of what she called a little strangeness, sometimes, in the good man. This latter quality is indefinable, and perhaps non-existent. Let us now imagine Wakefield bidding adieu to his wife. It is the dusk of an October evening. His equipment is a drab greatcoat, a hat covered with an 174 WAKEFIELD. oilcloth, top-boots, an umbrella in one hand and a small portmanteau in the other. He has informed Mrs. Wakefield that he is to take the night-coach into the country. She would fain inquire the length of his journey, its object, and the probable time of his re- turn; but, indulgent to his harmless love of mystery, interrogates him only by a look. - He tells her not to expect him positively by the return coach, nor to be alarmed .should he tarry three or four days; but, at all events, to look for him at supper on Friday even- ing. Wakefield himself, be it considered, has no suspicion of what is before him. He holds out his hand ; she gives her own, and meets his parting kiss, in the matter-of-course way of a ten years’ matri- ‘mony ; and forth goes the middle-aged Mr. Wake- field, almost resolved to perplex his good lady by a whole week’s absence. . After the door has closed behind him, she perceives it thrust partly open, and a vision of her husband’s face, through the aperture, smiling on her, and gone in a moment. For the time, this little incident is dismissed without a thought. But, long afterwards, when she has been more years a widow than a wife, that smile recurs, and flickers across all her reminiscences of Wakefield’s visage. In her many musings, she surrounds the original smile with a multitude of fantasies, which make it strange and awful; as, for instance, if she imagines him in a coffin, that parting look is frozen on his pale features; or, if she dreams of him in Heaven, still his blessed spirit wears a quiet and crafty smile. Yet, for its sake, when all others have given him up WAKEFIELD. 175 for dead, she sometimes doubts whether she is a widow. But, our business is with the husband. We must hurry after him, along the street, ere he lose’ his in-. dividuality, and melt into the great mass of London life. It would be vain searching for him there. Let us follow close at his heels, therefore, until, after several superfluous turns and doublings, we find him comfortably established by the fireside of a small apartment, previously bespoken. He is in the next street to his own, and at his journey’s end. He can scarcely trust his good fortune, in having got thither unperceived — recollecting that, at one time, he was delayed by the throng, in the very focus of a lighted lantern ; and, again, there were footsteps, that seemed to tread behind his own, distinct from the multitudi- nous tramp around him; and, anon, he heard a voice shouting afar, and fancied that it called his name. - Doubtless, a dozen busybodies had been watching him; and told his wife the whole affair. Poor Wake- field! Little knowest thou thine own insignificance in this great world! No mortal eye but mine has traced thee. Go quietly to thy bed, foolish man; and, on the morrow, if thou wilt be wise, get thee home to good Mrs. Wakefield, and tell her the truth. Remove not thyself, even for a little week, from thy place in her chaste bosom. Were she, for a single moment, to deem thee dead, or lost, or lastingly di- vided from her, thou wouldst be wofully conscious of a change in thy true wife, for ever after. It is peril- ous to make a chasm in human affections; not that 176 WAKEFIELD. they gape so long and wide —but so quickly close again ! Almost repenting of his felis or whatever it may be termed, Wakefield lies down betimes, and starting from his first nap, spreads forth his arms into the wide and solitary waste of the unaccustomed bed. ‘No’—thinks he, gathering the bed-clothes about him —‘I will not sleep alone another night.’ In the morning, he rises earlier than usual, and sets himself to phades what he really means to do. Such are his loose and rambling modes of thought, that he has taken this very singular step, with the consciousness of a purpose, indeed, but without being able to define it sufficiently for his own contempla- tion. The vagueness of the project, and the con- vulsive effort with which he plunges into the execu- tion of it, are equally characteristic of a feeble-minded man. Wakefield sifts his ideas, however, as minutely as he may, and finds himself curious to know the pro- gress of matters at home —how his exemplary wife will endure her widowhood, of a week; and, briefly, how the little sphere of creatures and circumstances, in which he was a central object, will be affected by his removal. A morbid vanity, therefore, lies nearest the bottom of the affair. But, how is he to attain his ends? Not, certainly, by keeping close in this com- fortable lodging, where, though he slept and awoke in the next street to his home, he is as effectually abroad, as if the stage-coach had been whirling him away all night. Yet, should he re-appear, the whole project is knocked in the head. His poor brains +e WAKEFIELD. 177 being hopelessly puzzled with this dilemma, he at length ventures out, partly resolving to cross the head of the street, and send one hasty glance towards his forsaken domicile. Habit—‘for he is a man of habits — takes him by the hand, and guides him, wholly unaware, to his own door, where, just at the critical moment, he is aroused by the scraping of his foot upon the step. Wakefield! whither are you going ? At that instant, his fate was turning on the pivot. Little dreaming of the doom to which his first back- ward step devotes him, he hurries away, breathless with agitation hitherto unfelt, and hardly dares turn his head, at the distant corner. Can it be, that no- body caught sight of him? Will not the whole house- hold —the decent Mrs. Wakefield, the smart maid- servant, and the dirty little footboy — raise a hue- and-cry, through London streets, in pursuit of their fugitive lord and master? Wonderful escape! He gathers courage to pause and look homeward, but is perplexed with a sense of change about the familiar edifice, such as affects us all, when, after a separa- tion of months or years, we again see some hill or lake, or work of art, with which we were friends, of old. In ordinary cases, this indescribable impression is caused by the comparison and contrast between our imperfect reminiscences and the reality. In Wakefield, the magic of a single night has wrought a similar transformation, because, in that brief period, a great moral change has been effected. But this is a secret from himself. Before leaving the spot, he VOL. I. 12 178 WAKEFIELD. catches a far and momentary glimpse of his wife, passing athwart the front window, with her face turn- ed towards the head of the street. The crafty nin- compoop takes to his heels, scared with the idea, that, among a thousand such atoms of mortality, her eye must have detected him. Right glad is his heart, though his brain be somewhat dizzy, when he finds himself by the coal-fire of his lodgings. So much for the commencement of this long whim- wham. After the initial conception, and the stirring up of the man’s sluggish temperament to put it in practice, the whole matter evolves itself in a natural train. We may suppose him, as the result of deep deliberation, buying a new wig, of reddish hair, and selecting sundry garments, in a fashion unlike his customary suit of brown, from a Jew’s old-clothes bag. It is accomplished. Wakefield is another man. The new system being now established, a retrograde movement to the old would be almost as difficult as the step that placed him in his unparalleled position. Furthermore, he is rendered obstinate by a sulkiness, occasionally incident to his temper, and brought on, at present, by the inadequate sensation which he con- ceives to have been produced in the bosom of Mrs. Wakefield. He will not go back until she be fright- ened half to death. Well; twice or thrice has she passed before his sight, each time with a heavier step, a paler cheek, and more anxious brow ; and in the third week of his non-appearance, he detects a portent of evil entering the house, in the guise of an apothecary. Next day, the knocker is muffled. 'To- WAKEFIELD. 179 wards night-fall, comes the chariot of a physician, and deposits its big-wigged and solemn burthen at Wakefield’s door, whence, after a quarter of an hour’s visit, he emerges, perchance the herald of a funeral. Dear woman! Will she die? By this time, Wakefield is excited to something like energy of feel- ing, but still lingers away from his wife’s bed-side, pleading with his conscience, that she must not be disturbed at such a juncture. If aught else restrains him, he does not know it. In the course of a few weeks, she gradually recovers; the crisis is over; her heart is sad, perhaps, but quiet; and, let him re- turn soon or late, it will never be feverish for him again. Such ideas glimmer through the mist of Wakefield’s mind, and render him indistinctly con- scious, that an almost impassable gulf divides his hired apartment from his former home. ‘ It is but in the next street!’ he sometimes says. Fool! it is in another world. Hitherto, he has put off his return from one particular day to another; henceforward, he leaves the precise time undetermined. Not to- morrow — probably next week — pretty soon. Poor man! ‘The dead have nearly as much chance of re- visiting their earthly homes, as the self-banished Wakefield. Would that I had a folio to write, instead of an article of a dozen pages! Then might 1 exemplify how an influence, beyond our control, lays its strong hand on every deed which we do, and weaves its consequences into an iron tissue of necessity. Wake field is spell-bound. We must leave him, for ten 180 WAKEFIELD. years or so, to haunt around his house, without once crossing the threshold, and to be faithful to his wife, with all the affection of which his heart is capable, while he is slowly fading out of hers. Long since, it must be remarked, he has lost the perception of singularity in his conduct. Now for a scene! Amid the throng of a London street, we distinguish a man, now waxing elderly, with few characteristics to attract careless observers, yet bearing, in his whole aspect, the hand-writing of no common fate, for such as have the skill to read it. He is meagre ; his low and narrow forehead is deeply wrinkled; his eyes, small and lustreless, sometimes wander apprehensively about him, but oftener seem to look inward. He bends his head, and moves with an indescribable obliquity of gait, as if unwilling to display his full front to the world. Watch him, long enough to see what we have described, and you will allow, that circumstances— which often produce re- markable men from nature’s ordinary handiwork — have produced one such here. Next, leaving him to sidle along the foot-walk, cast your eyes in the oppo- site direction, where a portly female, considerably in the wane of life, with a prayer-book in her hand, is proceeding to yonder church. She has the placid mien of settled widowhood. Her regrets have either died away, or have become so essential to her heart, that they would be poorly exchanged for joy. Just as the lean man and. well-conditioned woman are passing, a slight obstruction occurs, and brings these two figures directly in contact. Their hands touch ; WAKEFIELD. 181 the pressure of the crowd forces her bosom against his shoulder; they stand, face to face, staring into each other’s eyes. After a ten years’ separation, thus Wakefield meets his wife ! The throng eddies away, and carries them asunder. The sober widow, resuming her former pace, pro- ceeds to church, but pauses in the portal, and throws a perplexed glance along the street. She passes in, however, opening her prayer-book as she goes. And the man? With so wild a face, that busy and selfish London stands to gaze after him, he hurries to his lodgings, bolts the door, and throws himself upon the bed. The latent feelings of years break out; his feeble mind acquires a brief energy from their strength; all the miserable strangeness of his life is revealed to him at a glance: and he cries out, passionately —‘ Wakefield ! Wakefield! You are mad ! ° Perhaps he was so. The singularity of his situa- tion must have so moulded him to itself, that, con- sidered in regard to his fellow-creatures and the business of life, he could not be said to possess his right mind. He had contrived, or rather he had hap- pened, to dissever himself from the world — to vanish —to give up his place and privileges with living men, without being admitted among the dead. The life of a hermit is nowise parallel to his. He was in the bustle of the city, as of old; but the crowd swept by, and saw him not; he was, we may figuratively say, always beside his wife, and at his hearth, yet must never feel the warmth of the one, nor the affec- 182 WAKEFIELD. tion of the other. It was Wakefield’s unprecedented fate, to retain his original share of human sympathies, and to be still involved in human interests, while he had lost his reciprocal influence on them. It would be a most curious speculation, to trace out the effect of such circumstances on his heart and intellect, sep- arately, and in unison. Yet, changed as he was, he would seldom be conscious of it, but deem himself the same man as ever; glimpses of the truth, indeed, would come, but only for the moment; and still he would keep saying —‘I shall soon go back!’ — nor reflect, that he had been saying so for twenty years. I conceive, also, that these twenty years would ap- pear, in the retrospect, scarcely longer than the week to which Wakefield had at first limited his absence. He would look on the affair as no more than an inter- lude in the main business of his life. When, after a little while more, he should deem it time to reénter his parlor, his wife would clap her hands for joy, on beholding the middle-aged Mr. Wakefield. Alas, what a mistake! Would Time but await the close of our favorite follies, we should be young men, all of us, and till Doomsday. One evening, in the twentieth year since he van- ished, Wakefield is taking his customary walk towards the dwelling which he still calls his own. It is a gusty night of autumn, with frequent showers, that patter down upon the pavement, and are gone, before a man can put up his umbrella. Pausing near the house, Wakefield discerns, through the parlor-windows of the second floor, the red glow, and the glimmer and fitful WAKEFIELD. 183 flash, of a comfortable fire. On the ceiling appears a grotesque shadow of good Mrs. Wakefield. The cap, the nose and chin, and the broad waist, form an ad- mirable caricature, which dances, moreover, with the up-flickering and down-sinking blaze, almost too mer- rily for the shade of an elderly widow. At this instant, a shower chances to fall, and is driven, by the unmannerly gust, full into Wakefield’s face and bosom. He is quite penetrated with its autumnal chill. Shall he stand, wet and shivering here, when his own hearth has a good fire to warm him, and his own wife will run to fetch the gray coat and small- clothes, which, doubtless, she has kept carefully in the closet of their bedchamber? No! Wakefield is no such fool. He ascends the steps— heavily ! — for twenty years have stiffened his legs, since he came down —but he knows it not. Stay, Wake- field! Would you go to the sole home that is left you? Then step into your grave! The door opens. As he passes in, we have a parting glimpse of his visage, and recognise the crafty smile, which was the precursor of the little joke, that he has ever since been playing off at his wife’s expense. How unmer- cifully has he quizzed the poor woman ! Well, a good night’s rest to Wakefield ! This happy event— supposing it to be such— could only have occurred at an unpremeditated mo- ment. We will not follow our friend across the threshold. He has left us much food for thought, a portion of which shall lend its wisdom toa moral, and be shaped into a figure. Amid the seeming con- 184 WAKEFIELD. fusion of our mysterious world, individuals are so nicely adjusted to a system, and systems to one another, and to a whole, that, by stepping aside fora moment, a man exposes himself to a fearful risk of . losing his place for ever. Like Wakefield, he may become, as it were, the Outcast of the Universe. A RILL FROM THE TOWN-PUMP. A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. (Scene — the corner of two principal streets The Town Pump talking through its nose.) Noon, by the north clock! Noon, by the east! High noon, too, by these hot sunbeams, which fall, _ scarcely aslope, upon my head, and almost make the water bubble and smoke, in the trough under my nose. Truly, we public characters have a tough time of it! And, among all the town officers, chosen at March meeting, where is he that sustains, for a single year, the burthen of such manifold duties as are imposed, in perpetuity, upon the Town Pump? The title of ‘town treasurer’ is rightfully mine, as guardian of the best treasure that the town has. The overseers of the poor ought to make ime their chatr- man, since | provide bountifully for the pauper, with- } Essex and Washington streets, Salem. 188 A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. out expense to him that pays taxes. Jam at the head of the fire department, and one of the physi- cians to the board of health. Asa keeper of the peace, all water-drinkers will confess me equal to the constable. I perform some of the duties of the . town clerk, by promulgating public notices, when they are posted on my front. To speak within bounds, I am the chief person of the municipality, and exhibit, moreover, an admirable pattern to my brother officers, by the cool, steady, upright, down- right, and impartial discharge of my business, and the constancy with which I stand to my post. Sum- mer or winter, nobody seeks me in vain; for, all day long, I am seen at the busiest corner, just above the market, stretching out my arms, to rich and poor alike ; and at night, I hold a lantern over my head, both to show where I am, and keep people out of the gutters. . . ; At this sultry noontide, I am cupbearer to the parched populace, for whose benefit an iron goblet is chained to my waist. Like a dramseller on the mall, at muster day, I cry aloud to all and sundry, in my plainest accents, and at the very tiptop of my voice. Here it is, gentlemen! Here is the good liquor! Walk up, walk up, gentlemen, walk up, walk up! Here is the superior stuff! Here is the unadultera- ted ale of father Adam — better than Cognac, Hol- lands, Jamaica, strong beer, or wine of any price ; here it is, by the hogshead or the single glass, and not a cent to pay! Walk up, gentlemen, walk up, and help yourselves ! 3 . A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. 189 It were a pity, if all this outcry should draw no customers. Here they come. A hot day, gentle- men! Quaff, and away again, so as to keep your- selves in a nice cool sweat. You, my friend, will need another cup-full, to wash the dust out of your throat, if it be as thick there as it is on your cowhide shoes. I see that you have trudged half a score of -miles today; and, like a wise man, have passed by the taverns, and stopped at the run- ning brooks and well-curbs. Otherwise, betwixt heat without and fire within, you would have been burnt to a cinder, or melted down to nothing at all, in the fashion of a jelly-fish. Drink, and make room for that other fellow, who seeks my aid to quench the fiery fever of last night’s potations, which he drained from no cup of mine. Welcome, most rubi- cund sir! You and I have been great strangers, hitherto ; nor, to confess the truth, will my nose be anxious for a closer intimacy, till the fumes of your breath be a little less potent. Mercy on you, man! the water absolutely hisses down your red-hot gullet, and is converted quite to steam, in the miniature tophet, which you mistake for a stomach. Fill again, and tell me, on the word of an honest toper, did you ever, in cellar, tavern, or any kind of a dram- shop, spend the price of your children’s food, for a swig half so delicious ? Now, for the first time these ten years, you know the flavor of cold water. Good- by ; and, whenever you are thirsty, remember that I keep aconstant supply, at the old stand. Who next? Oh, my little friend, you are let loose from school, 190 A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. and come hither to scrub your blooming face, and drown the memory of certain taps of the ferule, and other schoolboy troubles, in a draught from the Town Pump. ‘Take it, pure as the current of your young life. ‘Take it, and may your heart and tongue never be scorched with a fiercer thirst than now! There, my dear child, put down the cup, and yield your place to this ‘elderly gentleman, who treads so ten- derly over the paving-stones, that I suspect he is afraid of breaking them. What! he limps by, with- out so much as thanking me, as if my hospitable offers were meant only for people who have no wine cellars. Well, well, sir—no harm done, I hope! Go draw the cork, tip the decanter; but, when your great toe shall set you a-roaring, it will be no affair of mine. If gentlemen love the pleasant titillation of the gout, it is all one to the Town Pump. This thirsty dog, with his red tongue lolling out, does not scorn my hospitality, but stands on his hind legs, and laps eagerly out of the trough. See how lightly he capers away again! Jowler, did your worship ever have the gout? Are you all satisfied? Then wipe your mouths, my good friends ; and, while my spout has a mo- ment’s leisure, 1 will delight the town with a few historical reminiscences. In far antiquity, beneath a darksome shadow of venerable boughs, a spring bubbled out of the leaf-strewn earth, in the very spot where you now behold me, on the sunny pavement. The water was as bright and clear, and deemed as precious, as liquid diamonds. The Indian sagamores A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. 19] drank of it, from time immemorial, till the fatal del- uge of the fire-water burst upon the red men, and swept their whole race away from the cold fountains. Endicott, and his followers, came next, and often knelt down to drink, dipping their long beards in the spring. The richest goblet, then, was of birch bark. Governor Winthrop, after a journey afoot from Bos- ton, drank here, out of the hollow of his hand. The elder Higginson here wet his palm, and laid it on the brow of the first town-born child. For many years it was the watering-place, and, as it were, the wash- bowl of the vicinity — whither all decent folks re- sorted, to purify their visages, and gaze at them afterwards — at least, the pretty maidens did — in the mirror which it made. On Sabbath days, when- ever a babe was to be baptized, the sexton filled his basin here, and placed it on the communion-table of the humble meeting-house, which partly covered the site of yonder stately brick one. Thus, one genera- tion after another was consecrated to Heaven by its waters, and cast their waxing and waning shadows into its glassy bosom, and vanished from the earth, as if mortal life were but a flitting image in a foun- tain. Finally, the fountain vanished also. Cellars were dug on all sides, and cart-loads of gravel flung upon its source, whence oozed a turbid stream, form- ing a mudpuddle, at the corner of two streets. In the hot months, when its refreshment was most needed, the dust flew in clouds over the forgotten birthplace of the waters, now their grave. But, in the course of time, a Town Pump was sunk into the 192 A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. source of the ancient spring ; and when the first de- cayed, another took its place—and then another, and still another — till here stand I, gentlemen and ladies, to serve you with my iron goblet. Drink, and be refreshed! The water is as pure and cold as that which slaked the thirst of the red sagamore, beneath the aged boughs, though now the gem of the wilderness is treasured under these hot stones, where no shadow falls, but from the brick buildings. And be it the moral of my story, that, as this wasted and long-lost fountain is now known and prized again, so shall the virtues of cold water, too little valued since your fathers’ days, be recognised by all. Your pardon, good people! I must interrupt my stream of eloquence, and spout forth a stream of water, to replenish the trough for this teamster and his two yoke of oxen, who have come from Topsfield, or somewhere along that way. No part of my busi- ness is pleasanter than the watering of cattle. Look! how rapidly they lower the watermark on the sides of the trough, till their capacious stomachs are mois- tened with a gallon or two apiece, and they can afford time to breathe it in, with sighs of calm enjoy- ment. Now they roll their quiet eyes around the brim of their monstrous drinking-vessel. An ox is your true toper. But I perceive, my dear auditors, that you are im- patient for the remainder of my discourse. Impute it, I beseech you, to no defect of modesty, if I insist a little longer on so fruitful a topic as my own multifa- rious merits. It is altogether for your good. The ” A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. 193 better you think of me, the better men and women will you find yourselves. I shall say nothing of my all-important aid on washing-days ; though, on that account alone, I might call myself the household god of a hundred families. Far be it from me also, to hint, my respectable friends, at the show of dirty faces, which you would present, without my pains to keep you clean. Nor will | remind you how often, when the midnight bells make you tremble for your combustible town, you have fled to the Town Pump, and found me always at my post, firm, amid the con- fusion, and ready to drain my vital current in your behalf. Neither is it worth while to lay much stress on my claims to a medical diploma, as the physician, whose simple rule of practice is preferable to all the nauseous lore, which has found men sick or left them so, since the days of Hippocrates. Let us take a broader view of my beneficial influence on mankind. No; these are trifles, compared with the merits which wise men concede to me — if not in my single self, yet as the representative of a class— of being the grand reformer of the age. From my spout, and such spouts as mine, must flow the stream, that shall cleanse our earth of the vast portion,of its crime and anguish, which has gushed from the fiery fountains of the still. In this mighty enterprise, the cow shall be my great confederate. Milk and water! The Town Pump and the Cow! Such is the glorious co- partnership, that shall tear down the distilleries and brewhouses, uproot the vineyards, shatter the cider- presses, ruin the tea and coffee trade, and, finally VOL. I. 13 194. A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. monopolize the whole business of quenching thirst. Blessed consummation! Then, Poverty shall pass away from the land, finding no hovel so wretched, where her squalid form may shelter itself. Then Disease, for lack of other victims, shall gnaw its own heart, and die. Then Sin, if she do not die, shall lose half her strength. Until now, the phrensy of he- reditary fever has raged in the human blood, trans- mitted from sire to son, and rekindled, in every generation, by fresh draughts of liquid flame. When that inward fire shall be extinguished, the heat of pas- sion cannot but grow cool, and war —the drunken- ness of nations — perhaps will cease. At least, there will be no war of households. 'The husband and wife, drinking deep of peaceful joy — a calm bliss of tem- perate affections — shall pass hand in hand through life, and lie down, not reluctantly, at its protracted close. To them, the past will be no turmoil of mad dreams, nor the future an eternity of such moments as follow the delirium of the drunkard. ‘Their dead faces shall express what their spirits were, and are to be, by a lingering smile of memory and hope. Ahem! Dry work, this speechifying ; especially to an unpractised orator. I never conceived, till now, what toil the temperance lecturers undergo for my sake. Hereafter, they shall have the business to themselves. Do, some kind Christian, pump a stroke or two, just to wet my whistle. Thank you, sir! My dear hearers, when the world shall have been regen- erated, by my instrumentality, you will collect your useless vats and liquor casks into one great pile, and A RILL FROM THE TOWN FUMP. -° 195 make a bonfire, in honor of the Town Pump. And, when I shall have decayed, like my predecessors, then, if you revere my memory, let a marble foun- tain, richly sculptured, take my place upon this spot. Such monuments should be erected everywhere, and inscribed with the names of the distinguished cham- pions of my cause. Now listen ; for something very important is to come next. There are two or three honest friends of mine — and true friends, I know, they are — who, neverthe- less, by their fiery pugnacity in my behalf, do put me in fearful hazard of a broken nose, or even a total overthrow upon the pavement; and the loss of the treasure which I guard. I pray you, gentlemen, let this fault be amended. Is it decent, thiak you, to get tipsy with zeal for temperance, and take up the hon- orable cause of the Town Pump, in the style of a toper, fighting for his brandy bottle? Or, can the excellent qualities of cold water be no otherwise ex- emplified, than by plunging, slapdash, into hot water, and wofully scalding yourselves and other people? Trust me, they may. In the moral warfare, which ; you are to wage — and, indeed, in the whole conduct of your lives — you cannot choose a better example than myself, who have never permitted the dust and sultry atmosphere, the turbulence and manifold dis- quietudes of the world around me, to reach that deep, calm well of purity, which may be called my soul. And whenever I pour out that soul, it is to cool earth’s fever, or cleanse its stains. One o’clock! Nay, then, if the dinner-bell begins 196 A RILL FROM THE TOWN PUMP. to speak, I may as well hold my peace. Here comes a pretty young girl of my acquaintance, with a large stone pitcher for me to fill. May she draw a hus- band, while drawing her water, as Rachel did of old. Hold out your vessel, my dear! ‘There it is, full to the brim ; so now run home, peeping at your sweet image in the pitcher, as you go; and forget not, in a glass of my own liquor, to drink — ‘Success To THE Town Pump!’ THE GREAT CARBUNCLE, THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. A MYSTERY OF THE WHITE MOUNTAINS. Ar night-fall, once, in the olden time, on the rug- ged side of one of the Crystal Hills, a party of ad- venturers were refreshing themselves, after a toilsome and fruitless quest for the Great Carbuncle. They had come thither, not as friends, nor partners in the enterprise, but each, save one youthful pair, impelled by his own selfish and solitary longing for this won- drous gem. Their feeling of brotherhood, however, was strong enough to induce them to contribute a mutual aid in building a rude hut of branches, and kindling a great fire of shattered pines, that had drift- ? The Indian tradition, on which this somewhat extravagant tale is founded, is both too wild and too beautiful, to be ad- equately wrought up, in prose. Sullivan, in his history of Maine, written since the Revolution, remarks, that even then, the existence of the Great Carbuncle was not entirely dis- credited. * 200 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. ed down the headlong current of the Amonoosuck, on the lower bank of which they were to pass the night. There was but one of their number, perhaps, who had become so estranged from natural sympathies, by the absorbing spell of the pursuit, as to acknowledge no satisfaction at the sight of human faces, in the re- mote and solitary region whither they had ascended. A vast extent of wilderness lay between them and the nearest settlement, while scant a mile above their heads, was that bleak verge, where the hills throw off their shaggy mantle of forest trees, and either robe themselves in clouds, or tower naked into the sky. The roar of the Amonoosuck would have been too awful for endurance, if only a solitary man had listen- ed, while the mountain stream talked with the wind. The adventurers, therefore, exchanged hospitable greetings, and welcomed one another to the hut, where each man was the host, and all were the guests of the whole company. ‘They spread their individual supplies of food on the flat surface of a rock, and par- took of a general repast; at the close of which, a sentiment of good fellowship was perceptible among the party, though repressed by the idea, that the re- newed search for the Great Carbuncle must make them strangers again, in the morning. Seven men and one young woman, they warmed themselves to- gether at the fire, which extended its bright wall along the whole front of their wigwam. As they ob- served the various and contrasted figures that made up the assemblage, each man looking like a caricature of himself, in the unsteady light that flickered over THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 201 him, they came mutually to the conclusion, that an odder society had never met, in city or wilderness — on mountain or plain. The eldest of the group, a tall, lean, weather-beaten man, some sixty years of age, was clad in the skins of wild animals, whose fashion of dress he did well to imitate, since the deer,’ the wolf, and the bear, had long been his most intimate companions. He was one of those ill-fated mortals, such as the Indians told of, whom, in their early youth, the Great Carbuncle smote with a peculiar madness, and became the pas- sionate dream of their existence. All, who visited that region, knew him as the Seeker, and by no other name. As none could remember when he first took up the search, there went a fable in the valley of the Saco, that for his inordinate lust after the Great Car- buncle, he had been condemned to wander among the mountains till the end of time, still with the same _ feverish hopes at sunrise — the same despair at eve. Near this miserable Seeker sat a little elderly person- age, wearing a high crowned hat, shaped somewhat like a crucible. He was from beyond the sea, a Doctor Cacaphodel, who had wilted and dried himself into a mummy, by continually stooping over charcoal’ furnaces, and inhaling unwholesome fumes, during his researches in chemistry andalchymy. It was told of him, whether truly or not, that, at the commence- ment of his studies, he had drained his body of all its richest blood, and wasted it, with other inestimable ingredients, in an unsuccessful experiment — and had never been a well man since. Another of the adven- 202 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. turers was Master Ichabod Pigsnort, a weighty mer- chant and selectman of Boston, and an elder of the famous Mr. Norton’s church. His enemies had a ridiculous story, that Master Pigsnort was accustomed to spend a whole hour, after prayer-time, every morn- ing and evening, in wallowing naked among an im- mense quantity of pine tree shillings, which were the earliest silver coinage of Massachusetts. The fourth, whom we shall notice, had no name, that his com- panions knew of, and was chiefly distinguished by a sneer that always contorted his thin visage, and by a prodigious pair of spectacles, which were supposed to deform and discolor the whole face of nature, to this gentleman’s perception. The fifth adventurer like- wise lacked a name, which was the greater pity, as he appeared to be a poet. He was a bright-eyed man, but wofully pined away, which was no more than natural, if, as some people affirmed, his ordinary diet was fog, morning mist, and a slice of the densest cloud within his reach, sauced with moonshine, when- ever he could get it. Certain it is, that the poetry, which flowed from him, had a smack of all these dainties. The sixth of the party was a young man of haughty mien, and sat somewhat apart from the rest, wearing his plumed hat loftily among his. elders, while the fire glittered on the rich embroidery of his _ dress, and gleamed intensely on the jeweled pommel of his sword. This was the Lord de Vere, who, when at home, was said to spend much of his time in the burial-vault of his dead progenitors, rummaging their mouldy coffins in search of all the earthly pride THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 203 and vainglory, that was hidden among bones and dust; so that, besides his own share, he had the col- lected haughtiness of his whole line of ancestry. Lastly, there was a handsome youth in rustic garb, and by his side, a blooming little person, in whom a delicate shade of maiden reserve was just melting into the rich glow of a young wife’s affection. Her name was Hannah, and her husband’s Matthew ; two homely names, yet well enough adapted to the simple pair, who seemed strangely out of place among the whim- sical fraternity whose wits had been set agog by the Great Carbuncle. Beneath the shelter of one hut, in the bright blaze of the same fire, sat this varied group of adventurers, all so intent upon a single object, that, of whatever else they began to speak, their closing words were sure to be illuminated with the Great Carbuncle. Several related the circumstances that brought them thither. One had listened to a traveller’s tale of this marvelous stone, in his own distant country, and had immediately been seized with such a thirst for be- holding it, as could only be quenched in its intensest lustre. Another, so long ago as when the famous Captain Smith visited these coasts, had seen it blazing far at sea, and had felt no rest in all the intervening years; till now that he took up the search. A third, being encamped on a hunting expedition, full forty miles south of the White Mountains, awoke at mid- night, and beheld the Great Carbuncle gleaming like a meteor, so that the shadows of the trees fell back- ward from it. ‘They spoke of the innumerable at: 204 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. tempts, which had been made to reach the spot, and of the singular fatality which had hitherto withheld success from all adventurers, though it might seem so easy to follow to its source a light that overpowered the moon, and almost matched the sun. It was ob- servable that each smiled scornfully at the madness of every other, in anticipating better fortune than the past, yet nourished a scarcely hidden conviction, that he would himself be the favored one. As if to allay their too sanguine‘hopes, they recurred to the Indian traditions, that a spirit kept watch about the gem, and bewildered those who sought it, either by removing it from peak to peak of the higher hills, or by calling up - a mist from the enchanted lake over which it hung. But these tales were deemed unworthy of credit ;- all professing to believe, that the search had been baffled by want of sagacity or perseverance in the adventur- ers, ot such other causes as might naturally obstruct the passage to any given point, among the intrica- cies of forest, valley, and mountain. In a pause of the conversation, the wearer of the prodigious spectacles looked round upon the party, making each individual, in turn, the object of the sneer which invariably dwelt upon his countenance. ‘So, fellow-pilgrims,’ said he, ‘ here we are, seven wise men and one fair damsel — who, doubtless, is as wise as any gray-beard of the company: here we are, I say, all hound on the same goodly enterprise. Methinks now, it were not amiss, that each of us de- clare what he proposes to do with the Great Car- buncle, provided he have the good hap to clutch it. THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 205 What says our friend in the bear-skin ? How mean you, good sir, to enjoy the prize which you have been seeking, the Lord knows how long, among the Crystal Hills ? ’ ‘ How enjoy it!’ exclaimed the aged Seeker, bit- terly. ‘I hope for no enjoyment from it — that folly has past long ago! I keep up the search for this ac- cursed stone, because the vain ambition of my youth has become a fate upon me, in old age. The pur- suit alone is my strength — the energy of my soul— ' the warmth of my blood, and the pith and marrow of my bones! Were I to turn my back upon it, I should fall down dead, on the hither side of the Notch, which is the gateway of this mountain region. Yet, not to have my wasted life-time back again, would I give up my hopes of the Great Carbuncle! Having found it, I shall bear it to a certain’ cavern that I wot of, and there, grasping it in my arms, lie down and die, and keep it buried with me for ever.’ ‘Oh, wretch, regardless of the ‘interests of sci- ence !* cried. Doctor Cacaphodel, with philosophic indignation. ‘Thou art not worthy to behold, even from afar off, the lustre of this most precious gem that ever was concocted in the laboratory of Nature. Mine is the sole purpose for which a wise man may desire the possession of the Great Carbuncle. Im- mediately on obtaining it—for I have a presenti- ment, good people, that the prize is reserved to crown my scientific reputation —I shall return to Europe, and employ my remaining years in reducing it to its first elements. A portion of the stone will I grind 206 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. to impalpable powder ; other parts shall be dissolved in acids, or whatever solvents will act upon so admi- rable a composition ; and the remainder I design to melt in the crucible, or set on fire with the blowpipe. By these various methods, I shall gain an accurate analysis, and finally bestow the result of my labors upon the world, in a folio volume.’ / ‘ Excellent!’ quoth the man with the spectacles. ‘ Nor need you hesitate, learned sir, on account of the necessary destruction of the gem ; since the perusal of your folio may teach every mother’s son of us to concoct a Great Carbuncle of his own.’ ‘But, verily,’ said. Master Ichabod Pigsnort, ‘ for mine own part, I object to the making of these coun- terfeits, as being calculated to reduce the marketable value of the true gem. [I tell ye frankly, sirs, I have an interest in keeping up the price. Here have I quitted my regular traffic, leaving my warehouse in the care of my clerks, and putting my credit to great hazard, and furthermore, have put myself in peril of death or captivity by the accursed heathen savages —and all this without daring to ask the prayers of the congregation, because the quest for the Great Carbuncle is deemed little better than a traffic with the evil one. Now think, ye that I would have done this grievous wrong to my soul, body, reputation, and estate, without a reasonable chance of profit ?” ‘Not I, pious Master Pigsnort,’ said the man with the spectacles. ‘I never laid sucha great folly to thy charge.’ -- ‘Truly, I hope not,’ said the merchant. ‘ Now, * THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 207 as touching this Great Carbuncle, I am free to own that | have never had a glimpse of it; but be it only the hundredth part so bright as people tell, it will surely outvalue the Great Mogul’s best diamond, which he holds at an incalculable sum. Wherefore, lam minded to put the Great Carbuncle on shipboard, and voyage with it to England, France, Spain, Italy, or into Heathendom, if Providence should send me thither, and, in a word, dispose of the gem to the best. bidder among the potentates of the earth, that he may place it among his crown jewels. If any of ye have a wiser plan, let him expound it.” ‘That have I, thou sordid man!’ exclaimed the poet, ‘Dost thou desire nothing brighter than gold, that thou wouldst transmute all this ethereal lustre into such dross, as thou wallowest in already? For myself, hiding the jewel under my cloak, I shall hie me back to my attick chamber, in one of the dark- some alleys of London. There, night and day, will ] gaze upon it — my soul shall drink its radiance — it shall’ be diffused throughout my intellectual pow- ers, and gleam brightly in every line of poesy that I indite. ‘Thus, long ages after [am gone, the splen- dor of the Great Carbuncle will blaze around my name !’ ‘ Well said, Master Poet!’ cried he of the specta- cles. ‘Hide it under thy cloak, sayest thou? Why, it will gleam through the holes, and make thee look like a jack-o’lantern ! ’ ‘To think!” ejaculated the Lord de Vere, rather to himself than his companions, the best of whom he 208 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. held utterly unworthy of his intercourse — ‘ to think that a fellow in a tattered cloak should talk of con- veying the Great Carbuncle to a garret in Grubb street! Have not I resolved within myself, that the whole earth contains no fitter ornament for the great hall of my ancestral castle ? There shall it flame for ages, making a noonday of midnight, glittering on | the suits of armor, the banners, and escutcheons, that hang around the wall, and keeping bright the memo- ry of heroes. Wherefore have all other adventurers sought the prize in vain, but that I might win it, and make it a symbol of the glories of our lofty line? And never, on the diadem of the White Mountains, did the Great Carbuncle hold a place half so hon- ored, as is reserved for it in the hall of the de Veres!’ ‘It isa noble thought,’ said the Cynic, with an obsequious sneer. ‘ Yet, might I presume to say so, the gem would make a rare sepulchral lamp, and would display the glories of your lordship’s progeni- tors more truly in the ancestral vault, than in the castle hall.’ ne ‘Nay forsooth,’ observed Matthew, the young rustic, who sat hand in hand with his bride, ‘ the gentleman has bethought himself of a profitable use for this bright stone. Hannah here and I are seek- ing it for a like purpose” ‘How, fellow!’ exclaimed his lordship, in sur- prise. ‘What castle hall hast thou to hang it in? ‘No castle,’ replied Matthew, ‘ but as neat a cot- tage as any within sight of the Crystal Hills. Ye must know, friends, that Hannah and I, being wed- THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 209 ded the last week, have taken up the search of the Great Carbuncle, because we shall need its light in the long winter evenings; and it will be such a pretty thing. to show the neighbors when they visit us. It will shine through the house, so that we may pick upa pin in any corner, and will set all the windows a-glowing, as if there were a great fire of pine knots in the chimney. And then how pleasant, when we awake in the night, to be able to see one another’s faces !’ There was a general smile among the adventurers, at the simplicity of the young couple’s project, in regard to this wondrous and invaluable stone, with which the greatest monarch on earth might have been proud to adorn his palace. Especially the man with spectacles, who had sneered at all the company in turn, now twisted his visage into such an ex- pression of ill-natured mirth, that Matthew asked him, rather peevishly, what he himself meant to do with the Great Carbuncle. ‘The Great Carbuncle!’ answered the Cynic, with ineffable scorn. ‘ Why, you blockhead, there is no such thing, in rerum natura. I have come three thousand miles, and am resolved to set my foot on every peak of these mountains, and poke my head into every chasm, for the sole purpose of de- monstrating to the satisfaction of any man, one whit less an ass than thyself, that the Great Carbuncle is all a humbug!’ Vain and foolish were the motives that had brought most of the adventurers to the Crystal Hills, but none VOL. 1. 14 210 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. so vain, so foolish, and so impious too, as that of the scoffer with the prodigious spectacles. He was one of those wretched and evil men, whose yearnings are downward to the darkness, instead of Heaven- ward, and who, could they but extinguish the lights which God hath kindled for us, would count the midnight gloom their chiefest glory. As the Cynic spoke, several of the party were startled by a gleam of red splendor, that showed the huge shapes of the surrounding mountains, and the rock-bestrewn bed of the turbulent river, with an illumination unlike that of their fire, on the trunks and black boughs of the forest trees. They listened for the roll of thun- der, but heard nothing, and were glad that the tem- pest came not near them. The stars, those dial-points of Heaven, now warned the adventurers to close their eyes on the blazing logs, and open them, in dreams, to the glow of the Great Carbuncle. The young married couple had taken their lodg- ings in the furthest corner of the wigwam, and were separated from the rest of the party by a curtain of curiously woven twigs, such as might have hung, in deep festoons, around the bridal bower of Eve. The modest little wife had wrought this piece of tapestry, while the other guests were talking. She and her husband fell asleep with hands tenderly clasped, and awoke, from visions of unearthly radi- ance, to meet the more blessed light of one another’s eyes. They awoke at the same instant, and with one happy smile beaming over their two faces, which grew brighter, with their consciousness of the reality THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 211 of life and love. But no sooner did she recollect where they were, than the bride peeped through the interstices of the leafy curtain, and saw that the outer room of the hut was deserted. ‘Up, dear Matthew!’ cried she, in haste. ‘ The strange folk are all gone! Up, this very minute, or we shall lose the Great Carbuncle !’ In truth, so little did these poor young people de- serve the mighty prize which had lured them thither, that they had slept peacefully all night, and till the summits of the hills were glittering with sunshine ; while the other adventurers had tossed their limbs in feverish wakefulness, or dreamed of climbing precipices, and set off to realize their dreams with the earliest peep of dawn. But Matthew and Han- nah, after their calm rest, were as light as two young deer, and merely stopped to say their prayers, and wash themselves in a cold pool of the Amonoosuck, and then to taste a morsel of food, ere they turned their faces to the mountain side. It was a sweet emblem of conjugal affection, as they toiled up the difficult ascent, gathering strength from the mutual aid which they afforded. After several little acci- dents, such as a torn robe, a lost shoe, and the entanglement of Hannah’s hair in a bough, they reached the upper verge of the forest, and were now to pursue a more adventurous course. The innumerable trunks and heavy foliage of the trees had hitherto shut in their thoughts, which now shrank affrighted from the region of wind, and cloud, and naked rocks, and desolate sunshine, that rose im- 212 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. measurably above them. They gazed back at the obscure wilderness which they had traversed, and longed to be buried again in its depths, rather than trust themselves to so vast and visible a solitude. ‘Shall we go on?’ said Matthew, throwing his arm round Hannah’s waist, both to protect her, and to comfort his heart by drawing her close to it. But the little bride, simple as she was, had a wo- man’s love of jewels, and could not forego the hope of possessing the very brightest in the world, in spite of the perils with which it must be won. ‘Let us climb a little higher,’ whispered she, yet tremulously, as she turned her face upward to the lonely sky. ‘Come then,’ said Matthew, mustering his manly courage, and drawing her along with him; for she became timid again, the moment that he grew bold. And upward, accordingly, went the pilgrims of the Great Carbuncle, now treading upon the tops and thickly interwoven branches of dwarf pines, which, by the growth of centuries, though mossy with age, had barely reached three feet in altitude. Next, they came to masses and fragments of naked rock, heaped confusedly together, like a cairn reared by giants, in memory of a giant chief. In this bleak realm of upper air, nothing breathed, nothing grew ; there was no life but what was concentred in their two hearts; they had climbed so high, that Nature herself seemed no longer to keep them company, She lingered beneath them, within the verge of the forest trees, and sent a farewell glance after her THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 213 children, as they strayed where her own green foot- prints had never been. But soon they were to be hidden from her eye. Densely and dark, the mists began to gather below, casting black spots of shadow on the vast landscape, and sailing heavily to one centre, as if the loftiest mountain peak had summon- ed a council of its kindred clouds. Finally, the vapors welded themselves, as it were, into a mass, presenting the appearance of a pavement over which the wanderers might have trodden, but where they would vainly have sought an avenue to the blessed earth which théy had lost. And the lovers yearned to behold that green earth again, more intensely, alas! than, beneath a clouded sky, they had ever desired a glimpse of Heaven. They even felt it a relief to their desolation, when the mists, creeping gradually up the mountain, concealed its lonely peak, and thus annihilated, at least for them, the _ whole region of visible space. But they drew closer together, with a fond and melancholy gaze, dreading lest the universal cloud should snatch them from each other’s sight. Still, perhaps, they would have been resolute to climb as far and as high, between earth and heaven, as they could find foot-hold, if Hannah’s strength had not begun to fail, and with that, her courage also. Her breath grew short. She refused to bur- then her husband with her weight, but often tottered against his side, and recovered herself each time by a feebler effort. At last, she sank down on one of the rocky steps of the acclivity. 214 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. ‘We are lost, dear Matthew,’ said she, mourn- fully. ‘ We shall never find our way to the earth again. And, oh, how happy we might have been in our cottage ! ’ ‘ Dear heart !— we will yet be happy there,’ an- swered Matthew. ‘ Look! In this direction, the sun- shine penetrates the dismal mist. By its aid, I can direct our course to the passage of the Notch. Let us go back, love, and dream no more of the Great Carbuncle !’ ‘The sun cannot be yonder,’ said Hannah, with despondence. ‘By this time, it must be noon. If there could ever be any sunshine here, it would come from above our heads.’ ‘But, look!’ repeated Matthew, in a somewhat altered tone. ‘It is brightening every moment. If not sunshine, what can it be ?’ Nor could the young bride any longer deny, that a radiance was breaking through the mist, and chang- ing its dim hue to a dusky red, which continually grew more vivid, as if brilliant particles were inter- fused with the gloom. Now, also, the cloud began to roll away from the mountain, while, as it heavily withdrew, one object after another started out of its impenetrable obscurity into sight, with precisely the effect of a new creation, before the indistinctness of the old chaos had been completely swallowed up. As the process went on, they saw the gleaming of water close at their feet, and found themselves on the very border of a mountain lake, deep, bright, clear, and calmly beautiful, spreading from brim to THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 215 brim of a basin that had been scooped out of the solid rock. A ray of glory flashed across its surface. The pilgrims looked whence it should proceed, but closed their eyes with a thrill of awful admiration, to exclude the fervid splendor that glowed from the brow of a cliff, impending over the enchanted lake. For the simple pair had reached that lake of mys- tery, and found the long-sought shrine of the Great Carbuncle ! They threw their arms around each other, and trembled at their own success ; for as the legends of this wondrous gem rushed thick upon their memory, they felt themselves marked out by fate —and the consciousness was fearful. Often, from childhood upward, they had seen it shining like a distant star. And now that star was throwing its intensest lustre on their hearts. ‘They seemed changed to one an- other’s eyes, in the red brilliancy that flamed upon their cheeks, while it lent the same fire to the lake, the rocks, and sky, and to the mists which had rolled back before its power. But, with their next glance, they beheld an object that drew their attention even from the mighty stone. At the base of the cliff, directly beneath the Great Carbuncle, appeared the figure of a man, with his arms extended in the act of climbing, and his face turned upward, as if to drink the full gush of splendor. But he stirred not, no more than if changed to marble. ‘It is the Seeker,’ whispered Hannah, convulsively grasping her husband’s arm. ‘ Matthew, he is dead.’ ‘The joy of success has killed him,’ replied 216 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. Matthew, trembling violently. ‘Or perhaps the very light of the Great Carbuncle was death!’ ‘The Great Carbuncle,’ cried a peevish voice be- hind them. ‘The Great Humbug! If you have found it, prithee point it out to me.’ They turned their heads, and there was the Cynic, with his prodigious spectacles set carefully on his nose, staring now at the lake, now at the rocks, now at the distant masses of vapor, now right at the Great Car- buncle itself, yet seemingly as unconscious of its light, as if all the scattered clouds were condensed about his person. Though its radiance actually threw the shadow of the unbeliever at his own feet, as he turned his back upon the glorious jewel, he would not be convinced that there was the least glimmer there. ‘ Where is your Great Humbug ?’ he repeated. ‘I challenge you to make me see it!” ‘There,’ said Matthew, incensed at such perverse blindness, and turning the Cynic round towards the illuminated cliff. ‘Takeoff those abominable spec- tacles, and you cannot help seeing it!’ Now these colored spectacles probably darkened the Cynic’s sight, in at least as great a degree as the smoked glasses through which people gaze at an eclipse. With resolute bravado, however, he snatch- ed them from his.nose, and fixed a bold stare full upon the ruddy blaze of the Great Carbuncle. But, scarcely had he encountered it, when, with a deep, shuddering groan, he dropt his head, and pressed both hands across his miserable eyes. Thenceforth there THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 217 was, in very truth, no light of the Great Carbuncle, nor any other light on earth, nor light of Heaven it- self, for the poor Cynic. So long accustomed to view all objects through a medium that deprived them of every glimpse of brightness, a single flash of so glorious a phenomenon, striking upon his naked vis- ion, had blinded him for ever. ‘Matthew,’ said Hannah, clinging to him, ‘let us go hence!’ Matthew saw that she was faint, and kneeling down, supported her in his arms, while he threw some of the thrillingly-cold water of the enchanted lake upon her face and bosom. It revived her, but could not renovate her courage. ‘Yes, dearest!’ cried Matthew, pressing her trem- ulous form to his breast, —‘ we will go hence, and return to our humble cottage. The blessed sunshine, and the quiet moonlight, shall come through our win- dow. We will kindle the cheerful glow of our hearth, at eventide, and be happy in its light. But never again will we desire more light than all the world may share with us.’ ‘No,’ said his bride, ‘for how could we live by day, or sleep by night, in this awful blaze of the Great Carbuncle!’ Out of the hollow of their hands, they drank each a draught from the lake, which presented them its waters uncontaminated by an earthly lip: ‘Then, lending their guidance to the blinded Cynic, who ut- tered not a word, and even stifled his groans in his own most wretched heart, they began to descend the 218 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. mountain. Yet, as they left the shore, till then un- trodden, of the Spirit’s lake, they threw a farewell glance towards the cliff, and beheld the vapors gathering in dense volumes, through which the gem burned duskily. As touching the other pilgrims of the Great Car- buncle, the legend goes on to tell, that the worshipful Master Ichabod Pigsnort soon gave up the quest, as a desperate speculation, and wisely resolved to betake himself again to his warehouse, near the town-dock, in Boston. But, as he passed through the Notch of the mountains, a war party of Indians captured our unlucky merchant, and carried him to Montreal, there holding him in bondage, till, by the payment of a heavy ransom, he had wofully subtracted from his hoard of pine tree shillings. By his long absence, moreover, his affairs had become so disordered, that, for the rest of his life, instead of wallowing in silver, he had seldom a sixpence-worth of copper. Doctor Cacaphodel, the alchymist, returned to his laboratory with a prodigious fragment of granite, which he ground to powder, dissolved in acids, melted in the crucible, and burnt with the blowpipe, and published the result of his experiments in one of the heaviest folios of the day. And, for all these purposes, the gem itself could not have answered better than the granite. ‘The poet, by a somewhat similar mistake, made prize of a great piece of ice, which he found in a sunless chasm of the mountains, and swore that it corresponded, in all points, with his idea of the Great Carbuncle. The critics say, that, if his poetry THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. 219 lacked the splendor of the gem, it retained all the coldness of the ice. The Lord de Vere went back to his ancestral hall, where he contented himself with a wax-lighted chandelier, and filled, in due course of time, another coffin in the ancestral vault. As the funeral torches gleamed within that dark receptacle, there was no need of the Great Carbuncle to show the vanity of earthly pomp. The Cynic, having cast aside his spectacles, wan- dered about the world, a miserable object, and was punished with an agonizing desire of light, for the wilful blindness of his former life. ‘The whole night long, he would lift his splendor-blasted orbs to the moon and stars; he turned his face eastward, at sun- rise, as duly as a Persian idolater ; he made a pilgrim- age to Rome, to witness the magnificent illumination of Saint Peter’s church; and finally perished in the great fire of London, into the midst of which he had thrust himself, with the desperate idea of catching one feeble ray from the blaze, that was kindling earth and heaven. Matthew and his bride spent many peaceful years, and were fond of telling the legend of the Great Car- buncle. The tale, however, towards the close of their lengthened lives, did not meet with the full cre- dence that had been accorded to it by those, who re- membered the ancient lustre of the gem. For it is affirmed, that, from the hour when two mortals, had shown themselves so simply wise, as to reject a jewel which would have dimmed all earthly things, its splendor waned. When other pilgrims reached the 220 THE GREAT CARBUNCLE. cliff, they found only an opaque stone, with particles of mica glittering on its surface. There is also a tradition that, as the youthful pair departed, the gem was loosened from the forehead of the cliff, and fell into the enchanted lake, and that, at noontide, the Seeker’s form may still be seen to bend over its quenchless gleam. Some few believe that this inestimable stone is blazing, as of old, and say that they have caught its radiance, like a flash of summer lightning, far down the valley of the Saco. And be it owned, that, many a mile from the Crystal Hills, I saw a wondrous light around their summits, and was lured, by the faith of poesy, to be the latest pilgrim of the Great Car- BUNCLE. THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. THE PROPHETIC PICTURES.’ ‘Bur this painter!’ cried Walter Ludlow, with animation. ‘He not only excels in his peculiar art, but possesses vast acquirements in all other learning and science. He talks Hebrew with Doctor Mather, and gives lectures in anatomy to Doctor Boylston. In a word, he will meet the best instructed man among us, on his own ground. Moreover, he is a polished gentleman —a citizen of the world — yes, a true cosmopolite ; for he will speak like a native of each clime and country on the globe, except our own forests, whither he is now going. Nor is all this what I most admire in him.’ ‘Indeed!’ said Elinor, who had listened with a 1 This story was suggested by an anecdote of Stuart, re- lated in Dunlap’s History of the Arts of Design —a most en- tertaining book to the general reader, and a deeply interesting one, we should think, to the artist. 224 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES., woman’s interest to the description of such a man. ‘ Yet this is admirable enough.’ ‘Surely it is,’ replied her lover, ‘ but ‘far less so than his natural gift of adapting himself to every variety of character, insomuch that all men—and all women too, Elinor — shall find a mirror of them- selves in this wonderful painter. But the greatest wonder is yet to be told.’ ‘Nay, if he have more wonderful attributes than these,’ said Elinor, laughing, ‘ Boston is a perilous abode for the poor gentleman. Are you telling me of a painter, or a wizard ?’ ‘In truth,’ answered he, ‘ that question might be asked much more seriously than you suppose. They say that he paints not merely a man’s features, but his mind and heart. He catches the secret senti- ments and passions, and throws them upon the can- vas, like sunshine —or perhaps, in the portraits of dark-souled men, like.a gleam of infernal fire. It is -an awful gift,’ added Walter, lowering his voice from its tone of enthusiasm. ‘I shall be almost afraid to sit to him.’ ‘ Walter, are you in earnest?’ exclaimed Elinor. ‘For Heaven’s sake, dearest Elinor, do not let him paint the look which you now wear,’ said her lover, smiling, though rather perplexed. ‘There: it is passing away now, but when you spoke, you seemed frightened to death, and very sad besides. What were you thinking of ?’” > ‘Nothing; nothing,’ answered Elinor, hastily. ‘You paint my face with your own fantasies. Well, THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 225 come for me tomorrow, and we will visit this wonder- ful artist.’ But when the young man had departed, it cannot be denied that a remarkable expression was again visible on the fair and youthful face of his mistress. It was a sad and anxious look, little in accordance with what should have been the feelings of a maiden on the eve of wedlock. Yet Walter Ludlow was the chosen of her heart. ‘A look!’ said Elinor to herself. ‘No wonder that it startled him, if it expressed what I sometimes feel. I know, by my own experience, how frightful a look may be. But it was all fancy. I thought no- thing of it at the time—I have seen nothing of it since —I did but dream it.’ And she busied herself about the embroidery of a ruff, in which she meant that her portrait should be taken. The painter, of whom they had been speaking, was not one of those native artists, who at a later period than this, borrowed their colors from the In- dians, and manufactured their pencils of the furs of wild beasts. Perhaps, if he could have revoked his life and pre-arranged his destiny, he might have chosen to belong to that school without a master, in the hope of being at least original, since there were no works of art to imitate, nor rules to follow. But he had been born and educated in Europe. People said, that he had studied the grandeur or beauty of conception, and every touch of the master-hand, in all the most famous pictures, in cabinets and gal- VOL. I. 15 226 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. leries, and on the walls of churches, till there was nothing more for his powerful mind to learn. Art could add nothing to its lessons, but Nature might. He had therefore .visited a world, whither none of his professional brethren had preceded him, to feast his eyes on visible images, that were noble and pic- turesque, yet had never been transferred to canvas. America was too poor to afford other temptations to an artist of eminence, though many of the colonial gentry, on the painter’s arrival, had expressed a wish to transmit their lineaments to posterity, by means of his skill. Whenever such proposals were made, he fixed his piercing eyes on the applicant, and seemed to look him through and through. If he beheld only a sleek and comfortable visage, though there were a gold-laced coat to adorn the picture, and golden guineas to pay for it, he civilly rejected the task and the reward. But if the face were the index of any- thing uncommon, in thought, sentiment, or experi- ence; or if he met a beggar in the street, witha white beard and a furrowed brow; or if, sometimes a child happened to look up and smile: he would exhaust all the art on them, that he denied to wealth. Pictorial skill being so rare in the colonies, the painter became an object of general curiosity. If few or none could appreciate the technical merit of his productions, yet there were points, in regard to which the opinion of the crowd was as valuable as the refined judgment of the amateur. He watched the effect that each picture produced on such untu- tored beholders, and derived profit from their re- THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 227 marks, while they would as soon have thought of instructing Nature herself, as him who seemed to rival her. ‘Their admiration, it must be owned, was tinctured with the prejudices of the age and country. Some deemed it an offence against the Mosaic law, and even a presumptuous mockery of the Creator, to bring into existence such lively images of his crea- tures. Others, frightened at the art which could raise phantoms at will, and keep the form of the dead among the living, were inclined to consider the painter as a magician, or perhaps the famous Black Man, of old witch-times, plotting mischief in a new guise. These foolish fancies were more than half believed, among the mob. Even in superior circles, his char- acter was invested with a vague awe, partly rising like smoke-wreaths from the popular superstitions, but chiefly caused by the varied knowledge and talents which he made subservient to his profession. Being on the eve of marriage, Walter Ludlow and Elinor were eager to obtain their portraits, as the first of what, they doubtless hoped, would be a long series of family pictures. The day after the conver- sation above recorded, they visited the painter's rooms. A servant ushered them into an apartment, where, though the artist himself was not visible, there were personages, whom they could hardly for- bear greeting with reverence. They knew, indeed, that the whole assembly were but pictures, yet felt it impossible to separate the idea of life and intellect from such striking counterfeits. Several of the por- traits were known to them, either as distinguished 228 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. characters of the day, or their private acquaintances There was Governor Burnett, looking as if he had just received an undutiful communication from the House of Representatives, and were inditing a most sharp response. Mr. Cooke hung beside the ruler whom he opposed, sturdy, and somewhat puritanical, as be- fitted a popular leader. The ancient lady of Sir William Phipps eyed them from the wall, in ruff and farthingale, an imperious old dame, not unsuspected of witchcraft. John Winslow, then a very young man, wore the expression of warlike enterprise, which long afterwards made him a distinguished general. Their personal friends were recognised at a glance. In most of the pictures, the whole mind and charac- ter were brought out on the countenance, and con- centrated into a single look, so that, to speak para- doxically, the originals hardly resembled themselves so strikingly as the portraits did. Among these modern worthies, there were two old bearded Saints, who had almost vanished into the darkening canvas. There was also a pale, but un- faded Madonna, who had perhaps been worshiped in Rome, and now, regarded the lovers with such a mild and holy look, that they longed to worship too. ‘How singular a thought,’ observed Walter Lud- low, ‘that this beautiful face has been beautiful for above two hundred years! Oh, if all beauty would endure so well! Do you not envy her, Elinor ?’ ‘If earth were Heaven, I might,’ she replied. ‘But where all things fade, how miserable to be the one that could not fade !” THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 229 ‘This dark old St. Peter has a fierce and ugly scowl, saint though he be,’ continued Walter. ‘ He troubles me. But the Virgin looks kindly at us.’ ‘Yes; but very sorrowfully, methinks,’ said Elinor. The easel stood beneath these three old pictures, sustaining one that had been recently commenced. ' After a little inspection, they began to recognise the features of their own minister, the Rev. Dr. Colman, growing into shape and life, as’ it were, out of a cloud. ‘Kind old man!’ exclaimed Elinor. ‘ He gazes at me, as if he were about to utter a word of paternal advice.’ ‘ And at me,’ said Walter, ‘as if he were about to shake his head and rebuke me, for some suspected iniquity. But so does the original. I shall never feel quite comfortable under his eye, till we stand before him to be married.’ They now heard a footstep on the floor, and turn- ing, beheld the painter, who had been some moments in the room, and had listened to a few of their re- marks. He was a middle-aged man, with a counte- nance well worthy of his own pencil. Indeed, by the picturesque, though careless arrangement of his rich dress, and, perhaps, because his soul dwelt always among painted shapes, he looked somewhat like a portrait himself. His visiters were sensible of a kindred between the artist and his works, and felt as if one of the pictures had stept from the canvas to salute them. ; Walter Ludlow, who was slightly known to the painter, explained the object of their visit. While 230 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. he spoke, a sunbeam was falling athwart his figure and Elinor’s, with so happy an effect, that they also seemed living pictures of youth and beauty, glad- dened by bright fortune. The artist was evidently struck. ‘ My easel is occupied for several ensuing days, and my stay in Boston must be brief,’ said he, thoughtfully ; then, after an observant glance, he added : ‘ but your wishes shall be gratified, though I disappoint the Chief Justice and Madame Oliver. I must not lose this opportunity, for the sake of paint- ing a few ells of broadcloth and brocade.’ The painter expressed a desire to introduce both their portraits into one picture, and represent them — engaged in some appropriate action. This plan would have delighted the lovers, but was necessarily rejected, because so large a space of canvas would have been unfit for the room which it was intended to decorate. Two half-length portraits were there- fore fixed upon. After they had taken leave, Wal- ter Ludlow asked Elinor, with a smile, whether she knew what an influence over their fates the painter was about to acquire. ‘The old women of Boston affirm,’ continued he, ‘that after he has once got possession of a person’s face and figure, he may paint him in any act or situ- ation whatever — and the picture will be prophetic. Do you believe it ?’ ‘Not quite,” said Elinor, acting ‘Yet if he has such magic, there is something so gentle in his man- ner, that I am sure he will use it well.’ THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 231 It was the painter’s choice to proceed with both the portraits at the same time, assigning as a reason, in the mystical language which he sometimes used, that the faces threw light upon each other. Accord- ingly, he gave now a touch to Walter, and now to Elinor, and the features of one and the other began to start forth so vividly, that it appeared as if his tri- umphant art would actually disengage them from the canvas. Amid the rich light and deep shade, they beheld their phantom selves. But, though the like- ness promised to be perfect, they were not quite satisfied with the expression ; it seemed more vague than in most of the ‘painter’s works. He, however, was satisfied with the prospect of success, and being much interested in the lovers, employed his leisure moments, unknown to them, in making a crayon sketch of their two figures. During their sittings, he engaged them in conversation, and kindled up their faces with characteristic traits, which, though con- tinually varying, it was his purpose to combine and fix. At length he announced, that at their next visit both the portraits would be ready for delivery. ‘If my pencil will but be true to my conception, in the few last touches which I meditate,’ observed he, ‘ these two pictures will be my very best per- formances. Seldom, indeed, has an artist such sub- jects.’ While speaking, he still bent his penetrative eye upon them, nor withdrew it till they had reached the bottom of the stairs. Nothing, in the whole circle of human vanities, 232 THE PROPHETIC PCITURES. takes stronger hold of the imagination, than this affair of having a portrait painted. Yet why should it be so? The looking-glass, the polished globes of the andirons, the mirror-like water, and all other re- flecting surfaces, continually present us with portraits, or rather ghosts, of ourselves, which we glance at, and straightway forget them. But we forget them, only because they vanish. It is the idea of duration — of earthly immortality —that gives such a myste- rious interest to our own portraits. Walter and Eli- nor were not insensible to this feeling, and hastened to the painter’s room, punctually at the appointed hour, to meet those pictured shapes, which were to be their representatives with posterity. The sun- shine flashed after them into the apartment, but left it somewhat gloomy, as they closed the door. Their eyes were immediately attracted to their portraits, which rested against the farthest wall of the room. At the first glance, through the dim light and the distance, seeing themselves in precisely their natural attitudes, and with all the air that they recog- nised so well, they uttered a simultaneous exclama- tion of delight. ‘There we stand,’ cried Walter, enthusiastically, ‘ fixed in sunshine for ever! No dark passions can gather on our faces!’ * No,’ said Elinor, more calmly ; ‘no dreary change can sadden us.’ This was said while they were approaching, and had yet gained only an imperfect view of the pic- tures. ‘The painter, after saluting them, busied him- THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 30 self at a table in completing a crayon sketch, leaving his visiters to form their own judgment as to his per- fected labors. At intervals, he sent.a glance from beneath his: deep eyebrows, watching their coun- tenances in profile, with his pencil suspended over the sketch. They had now stood some moments, each in front of the other’s picture, contemplating it with entranced attention, but without uttering a word. At length, Walter stepped forward — then back — viewing Elinor’s portrait in various lights, and finally spoke. ‘Is there not a change ?” said he, in a doubtful and meditative tone. ‘Yes; the perception of it grows more vivid, the longer I look. It is certainly the same picture that I saw yesterday; the dress — the features —all are the same; and yet something is altered.’ ‘Ts then the picture less like than it was yesterday ?’ inquired the painter, now drawing near, with irrepres- sible interest. => ‘The features are perfect Elinor,’ answered Wal-. ter; “and, at the first glance, the expression seemed also hers. But, I could fancy that the portrait has changed countenance, while I have been looking at it. The eyes are fixed on mine with a strangely sad and anxious expression. Nay, it is grief and terror! Is this like Elinor ?” ‘Compare the living face with the pictured one,’ | said the painter. Walter glanced sidelong at his mistress, and start- ed. Motionless and absorbed — fascinated, as it 234 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. were — in contemplation of Walter’s portrait, Elinor’s face had assumed precisely the expression of which he had just been complaining. Had she practised for whole hours before a mirror, she could not have caught the look so successfully. Had the picture itself been a mirror, it could not have thrown back her present aspect, with stronger and more melan- choly truth. She appeared quite unconscious of the dialogue between the artist and her lover. ‘Elinor,’ exclaimed Walter, in amazement, what change has come over you?’ She did not hear him, nor desist from her fixed gaze, till he seized her hand, and thus attracted her notice; then, with a sudden tremor, she looked from the picture to the face of the original. ‘Do you see no change in your portrait?’ asked she. ‘In mine ?—None!’ replied Walter, examining it. ‘But let me see! Yes; there is a slight change —an improvement, I think, in the picture, though none in the likeness. It has a livelier expression than yesterday, as if some bright thought were flash- ing from the eyes, and about to be uttered from the lips. Now that I have caught the look, it be- comes very decided.’ While he was intent on these observations, Elinor turned to the painter. She regarded him with grief and awe, and felt that he repaid her with sympathy and commiseration, though wherefore, she could but vaguely guess. THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 235 ‘That look!’ whispered she, and shuddered, ‘ How came it there ?’ ‘Madam,’ said the painter, sadly, taking her hand, and leading her apart, ‘in both these pictures, I have painted what I saw, The artist — the true artist — must look beneath the exterior. It is his gift — his proudest, but often a melancholy one —to see the inmost soul, and, by a power indefinable even to himself, to make it glow or darken upon the canvas, in glances that express the thought and sentiment of years. Would that I might convince myself of error in the present instance ! ” They had now approached the table, on which were heads in chalk, hands almost as expressive as ordinary faces, ivied church-towers, thatched cot- tages, old thunder-stricken trees, oriental and antique costume, and all such picturesque vagaries of an artist's idle moments. Turning them over, with seeming carelessness, a crayon sketch of two figures was disclosed. ‘If I have failed,’ continued he ; —‘ if your heart does not see itself reflected in your own portrait — if you have no secret cause to trust my delineation of the other—itis not yet too late to alter them. I might change the action of these figures too. But would it influence the event ? ’ He directed her notice to the sketch. A thrill ran through Elinor’s frame ; a shriek was upon her lips 5 but she stifled it, with the self-command that becomes habitual to all, who hide thoughts of fear and anguish within their bosoms. Turning from the table, she 236 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. perceived that Walter had advanced near enough to have seen the sketch, though she could not determine whether it had caught his eye. ‘We will not have the pictures altered,’ said she, hastily. ‘If mine is sad, I shall but look the gayer for the contrast.’ ‘Be it so,’ answered the painter, bowing. ‘ May your griefs be such fanciful ones, that only your pic- ture may mourn for them! For your joys — may they be true and deep, and paint themselves upon this lovely face, till it quite belie my art!’ After the marriage of Walter and Elinor, the pic- tures formed the two most splendid ornaments of their abode. They hung side by side, separated by a narrow panel, appearing to eye each other con- stantly, yet always returning the gaze of the specta- tor. Travelled gentlemen, who professed a knowledge of such subjects, reckoned these among the most ad- mirable specimens of modern portraiture ; while com- mon observers compared them with the originals, fea- ture by feature, and were rapturous in praise of the likeness. But, it was on a third class, — neither travelled connoisseurs nor common observers, but people of natural sensibility — that the pictures wrought their strongest effect. Such persons might gaze carelessly at first, but, becoming interested, would return day after day, and study these painted faces like the pages of a mystic volume. Walter Ludlow’s portrait attracted their earliest notice. In the absence of himself and his bride, they sometimes disputed as to the expression which the painter had THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 287 intended to throw upon the. features; all agreeing | that there wasa look of earnest import, though no two explained it alike. There was less diversity of opinion in regard to Elinor’s picture. They differed, indeed, in their attempts to estimate the nature and depth of the gloom that dwelt upon her face, but agreed that it was gloom, and alien from the natural temperament of their youthful friend. A certain fanciful person announced, as the result of much scrutiny, that both these pictures were parts of one design, and that the melancholy strength of feeling, in Elinor’s countenance, bore reference to the more vivid emotion, or, as he termed it, the wild passion, in that of Walter. Though unskilled in the art, he even began a sketch, in which the action of the two figures was to correspond with their mutual ex- pression. It was whispered among friends, that, day by day, Elinor’s face was assuming a deeper shade of pen- siveness, which threatened soon to render her too true a’counterpart of her melancholy picture. Wal- ter, on the other hand, instead of acquiring the vivid look which the painter had given him on the canvas, became reserved and downcast, with no outward flashes of emotion, however it might be smouldering within. In course of time, Elinor hung a gorgeous curtain of purple silk, wrought with flowers, and fringed with heavy golden tassels, before the pic- ‘tures, undér pretence that the dust would tarnish their hues, or the light dim them. It was enough. Her visiters felt, that the massive folds of the silk 238 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. must never be withdrawn, nor the portraits men- tioned in her presence. Time wore on; and the painter came again. He had been far enough to the north to see the silver cascade of the Crystal Hills, and to look over the vast round of cloud and forest, from the summit of New England’s loftiest mountain. But he did not profane that scene by the mockery of his art. He had also lain in a canoe on the bosom of Lake George, making his soul the mirror of its loveliness and grandeur, till not a picture in the Vatican was more vivid than his recollection. He had gone with the Indian hunters to Niagara, and there, again, had flung his hopeless pencil down the precipice, feeling that he could as soon paint the roar, as aught else that goes to make up the wondrous cataract. In truth, it was seldom his impulse to copy natural scenery, except as a frame-work for the delineations of the human form and face, instinct with thought, passion, or suffering. With store of such, his adven- turous ramble had enriched him ; the stern dignity of Indian chiefs; the dusky lovedahes of Indian girls; the domestic life of wigwams ; the stealthy march ; the battle beneath gloomy pine trees; the frontier fortress with its garrison; the anomaly of the old French partisan, bred in courts, but grown gray in shaggy deserts; such were the scenes and portraits that he had sketched. The glow of perilous mo- ments; flashes of wild feeling; struggles of fierce power — love, hate, srief, frenzy — in a word, all the worn-out heart of the old earth, had been revealed to THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. 239 him under a new form. His portfolio was filled with graphic illustrations of the volume of his memory, which genius would transmute into its own substance, and imbue with immortality. He felt that the deep wisdom in his art, which he had sought so far, was found. But, amid stern or lovely nature, in the perils of the forest, or its overwhelming peacefulness, still there had been two phantoms, the companions of his way. Like all other men around whom an engross- ing purpose wreathes itself, he was insulated from the mass of human kind. He had no aim —no pleas- ure —no sympathies — but what were ultimately connected with his art. Though gentle in manner, and upright in intent and action, he did not possess kindly feelings ; his heart was cold; no living crea- ture could be brought near enough to keep him warm. For these two beings, however, he had felt, in its greatest intensity, the sort of interest which al- ways allied him to the subjects of his pencil. He had pried into their souls with his keenest insight, and pictured the result upon their features, with his ut- most skill, so as barely to fall short of that standard which no genius ever reached, his own severe con- ception. He had caught from the duskiness of the future—at least, so he fancied —a fearful secret, and had obscurely revealed it on the portraits. So much of himself—of his imagination and all other powers — had been lavished on the study of Walter and Elinor, that he almost regarded them as creations of his own, like the thousands with which he had 240 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. peopled the realms of Picture. Therefore did they flit through the twilight of the woods, hover on the mist of waterfalls, look forth from the mirror of the lake, nor melt away in the noontide sun. They haunt- ed his pictorial fancy, not as mockeries of life, nor pale goblins of the dead, but in the guise of portraits, each with the unalterable expression which his magic had evoked from the caverns of the soul. He could not recross the Atlantic, till he had again beheld the originals of those airy pictures. ‘Oh, glorious Art!’ thus mused the enthusiastic painter, as he trod the street. ‘Thou art the image of the Creator’s own. ‘The innumerable forms, that wander in nothingness, start into being at thy beck. The dead live again. Thou recallest them to their old scenes, and givest their gray shadows the lustre of a better life, at once earthly and immortal. Thou snatchest back the fleeting moments of History. With thee, there is no Past; for, at thy touch, all that is great becomes for ever present; and illustrious men live through long ages, in the visible performance of the very deeds, which made them what they are. Oh, potent Art! as thou bringest the faintly revealed Past to stand in that narrow strip of sunlight, which we call Now, canst thou summon the shrouded Future to meet her there? Have I not achieved it! Am I not thy Prophet?’ Thus, with a proud, yet melancholy fervor, did he almost cry aloud, as he passed through the toilsome street, among people that knew not of his reveries, nor could understand nor care for them. It is not THE PROPHETIC PICTURES, 241 good for man to cherish a solitary ambition. Unless there be those around him, by whose example he may regulate himself, his thoughts, desires, and hopes will become extravagant, and he the semblance, perhaps the reality, of a madman. Reading other bosoms, with an acuteness almost preternatural, the painter failed to see the disorder of his own. ¢ And this should be the house,’ said he, looking up and down the front, before he knocked. ‘ Heaven help my brains! That picture! Methinks it will never vanish. Whether I look at the windows or the door, there it is framed within them, painted strongly, and glowing in the richest tints — the faces of the por- traits — the figures and action of the sketch!’ He knocked. ‘The Portraits! Are they within?’ inquired he, of the domestic; then recollecting himself —‘ your master and mistréss! Are they at home?’ ‘They are, sir,’ said the servant, adding, as he noticed that picturesque aspect of which the painter could never divest himself, — ‘ and the Portraits too!’ The guest was admitted into a parlor, communica- ting by a central door, with an interior room of the same size. As the first apartment was empty, he passed to the entrance of the second, within which, his eyes were greeted by those living personages, as well as their pictured representatives, who had long been the objects of so singular an interest. He in- voluntarily paused on the threshold. They had not perceived his approach. Walter and Elinor were standing before the portraits, whence the VOL. I. 16 242 THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. former had just flung back the rich and voluminous folds of the silken curtain, holding its golden tassel with one hand, while the other grasped that of his bride. The pictures, concealed for months, gleamed forth again in undiminished splendor, appearing to throw a sombre light across the room, rather than to be disclosed by a borrowed radiance. ‘That of Elinor had been almost prophetic. A pensiveness, and next a gentle sorrow, had successively dwelt upon her countenance, deepening, with the lapse of time, into a quiet anguish. A mixture of affright would now have made it the very expression of the portrait. Walter’s face was moody and dull, or animated only by fitful flashes, which left a heavier darkness for their momentary illumination. He looked from Ehi- nor to her portrait, and thence to his own, in the con- templation of which he finally stood absorbed. The painter seemed to hear thé step of Destiny approaching behind him, on its progress towards its victims. A strange thought darted into his mind. Was not his own the form in which that Destiny had embodied itself, and he a chief agent of the coming evil which he had foreshadowed ? Still, Walter remained silent before the picture, communing with it, as with his own heart, and aban- doning himself to the spell of evil influence, that the painter had cast upon the features. Gradually his eyes kindled; while as Elinor watched the increasing wildness of his face, her own assumed a look of ter- ror; and when at last, he turned upon her, the re- semblance of both to their portraits was complete. THE PROPHETIC PICTURES. : 243 ‘Our fate is upon us!’ howled Walter. ‘Die!’ Drawing a knife, he sustained her, as she was sink- ing to the ground, and aimed it at her bosom. In the action, and in the look and attitude of each, the painter beheld the figures of his sketch. The picture, with all its tremendous coloring, was finished. * Hold, madman!’ cried he sternly. He had advanced from the door, and interposed himself between the wretched beings, with the same sense of power to regulate their destiny, as to alter a scene upon the canvas. He stood like a magician, controlling the phantoms which he had evoked. ‘What!’ muttered Walter Ludlow, as he relapsed from fierce excitement into sullen gloom. ‘ Does Fate impede its own decree ?’ ‘Wretched lady!’ said the painter. ‘Did I not warn you?’ ‘You did,’ replied Elinor calmly, as her terror gave place to the quiet grief which it had disturbed. ‘ But —I loved him!’ Is there not a deep moral in the tale? Could the result of one, or all our deeds, be shadowed forth and set before us—some would call it Fate, and hurry onward — others be swept along by their passionate - desires — and none be turned aside by the PRoPHETIC PICTURES. ce te aR rent’ DAVID SWAN. A FANTASY. WE can be but partially acquainted even with the events which actually influence our course through life, and our final destiny. There are innumerable other events, if such they may be called, which come close upon us, yet pass away without actual results, or even betraying their near approach, by the re- flection of any light or shadow across our minds. Could we know all the vicissitudes of our fortunes, life would be too full of hope and fear, exultation or disappointment, to afford us a single hour of true serenity. This idea may be illustrated by a page from the secret history of David Swan. We have nothing to do with David, until we find him, at the age of twenty, on the high road from his native place to the city of Boston, where his uncle, a small dealer in the grocery line, was to take him behind the counter. Be it enough to say, that he was %48 DAVID SWAN. a native of New Hampshire, born of respectable pa- rents, and had received an ordinary school education, with a ¢lassic finish by a year at Gilmanton acad- emy. After journeying on foot, from sunrise till nearly noon of a summer’s day, his weariness and the increasing heat determined him to sit down in _ the first convenient shade, and await the coming up of the stage coach. As if planted on purpose for him, there soon appeared a little tuft of maples, with a delightful recess in the midst, and such a fresh bubbling spring, that it seemed never to have sparkled for any wayfarer but David Swan. Virgin or not, he kissed it with his thirsty lips, and then flung himself along the brink, pillowing his head upon some shirts and a pair of pantaloons, tied up in a striped cotton handkerchief. The sunbeams could not reach him ; the dust did not yet rise from the road, after the heavy rain of yesterday ; and his grassy lair suited the young man better than a bed of down. The spring murmured drowsily beside him; the branches waved dreamily across the blue sky, overhead; and a deep sleep, perchance hiding dreams within its depths, fell upon David Swan. But we are to relate events which he did not dream of. While he lay sound asleep in the shade, other peo- ple were wide awake, and passed to and fro, a-foot, on horseback, and in all sorts of vehicles, along the. sunny road by his bedchamber. Some looked neither to the right hand nor the left, and knew not that he was there; some merely glanced that way, without admitting the slumberer among their busy thoughts ; DAVID SWAN. 249 some laughed to see how soundly he slept; and sev- eral, whose hearts were brimming full of scorn, ejected their venomous superfluity on David Swan. A middle-aged widow, when nobody else was near, thrust her head a little way into the recess, and vowed that the young fellow looked charming in his sleep. A temperance lecturer saw him, and wrought poor David into the texture of his evening’s discourse, as an awful instance of dead drunkenness by the road-side. But, censure, praise, merriment, scorn, and indifference, were all one, or rather all nothing, to David Swan. — He had slept only a few moments, when a brown carriage, drawn by a handsome pair of horses, bowled easily along, and was brought to a stand-still, nearly in front of David’s resting place. A t , Ly ip RNIN ;. eas aya 2 ands ees *s to va * eis? pereMs ae | ituliyw. fe eltihie aah eae spent oat? te vey’ Patterns ene at: igeenstnn: evan epee “Yealdviesy ony fo termi - ‘iat thevens4 4" rowonraled cet ase it dies in “aes omar gepe ieee eed ree alee oY ade we | is vot aavadt tage ae: OYE Bese, eee weayane 7 a hs ‘ ets » Une! Ys mls? tt Be 4 a f hy: i yl qnente: adh Ti . te ‘Wishtion 3 giv ee oie ‘ THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. Ar fifteen, I became a resident in a country village, more than a hundred miles from home. The morning after my arrival—a September morning, but warm and bright as any in July —I rambled into a wood of oaks, with a few walnut trees intermixed, forming the closest shade above my head. The ground was rocky, uneven, overgrown with bushes and clumps of young saplings, and traversed only by cattle-paths. The track, which I chanced to follow, led me to a crystal spring, with a border of grass, as freshly green as on May morning, and overshadowed by the limb of a great oak. One solitary sunbeam found its way down, and played like a goldfish in the water. From my childhood, I have loved to gaze into a spring. The water filled a circular basin, small but deep, and set round with stones, some of which were covered with slimy moss, the others naked, and of variegated hue, reddish, white, and brown. The bot- 294 THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. tom was covered with coarse sand, which sparkled in the lonely sunbeam, and seemed to illuminate the spring with an unborrowed light. In one spot, the gush of the water violently agitated the sand, but without obscuring the fountain, or breaking the glass- iness of its surface. It appeared as if some living creature were about to emerge, the Naiad of the spring, perhaps, in the shape of a beautiful young woman, with a gown of filmy water-moss, a belt of rainbow drops, and a cold, pure, passionless counte- nance. How would the beholder shiver, pleasantly, yet fearfully, to see her sitting on one of the’ stones, paddling her white feet in the ripples, and throwing up water, to sparkle in the sun! Wherever she laid her hands on grass and flowers, they would imme- diately be moist, as with morning dew. Then would she set about her labors, like a careful housewife, to clear the fountain of withered leaves, and bits of slimy wood, and old acorns from the oaks above, and grains of corn left by cattle in drinking, till the bright sand, in the bright water, were like a treasury of diamonds. But, should the intruder approach too near, he would find only the drops of a summer shower, glistening about the spot where he had seen her. Reclining on the border of grass, where the dewy goddess should have been, I bent forward, and a pair of eyes met mine within the watery mirror. They were the reflection of my own. I looked again, and lo! another face, deeper in the fountain than my own image, more distinct in all the features, yet faint THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. 295 as thought. The vision had the aspect of a fair young girl, with locks of paly gold. A mirthful ex- pression laughed in the eyes and dimpled over the whole shadowy countenance, till it seemed. just what a fountain would be, if, while dancing merrily into the sunshine, it should assume the shape of woman. Through the dim rosiness of the cheeks, I could see the brown leaves, the slimy twigs, the acorns, and the sparkling sand. The solitary sunbeam was dif- fused among the golden hair, which melted into its faint brightness, and became a glory round that head so beautiful ! My description can give no idea how suddenly the fountain was thus tenanted, and how soon it was left desolate. I breathed; and there was the face! I held my breath; and it was gone! Had it passed away, or faded into nothing? I doubted whether it had ever been. My sweet readers, what a dreamy and delicious hour did I spend, where that vision found and left me! For a long time, I sat perfectly still, waiting till it should reappear, and fearful that the slightest motion, or even the flutter of my breath, might fright- en it away. Thus have I often started fae a pleas- ant dream, and then kept quiet, in hopes to wile it back. Race were my musings, as to the race and attributes of that ethereal being. Had I created her? Was she the daughter of my fancy, akin to those strange shapes which peep under the lids of child- ren’s eyes? And did her beauty gladden me, for that one moment, and then die? Or was she a 296 THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. water-nymph within the fountain, or fairy, or wood- land goddess, peeping over my shoulder, or the ghost of some forsaken maid, who had drowned her- self for love? Or, in good truth, had a lovely girl, with a warm heart, and lips that would bear pressure, stolen softly behind me, and thrown her image into the spring ? I watched and waited, but no vision came again. I departed, but with a spell upon me, which drew me back, that same afternoon, to the haunted spring. There was the water gushing, the sand sparkling, and the sunbeam glimmering. There the vision was not, but only a great frog, the hermit of that solitude, who immediately withdrew his speckled snout and made himself invisible, all except a pair of long legs, beneath a stone. Methought he had a devilish look ! I could have slain him as an enchanter, who kept the mysterious beauty imprisoned in the fountain. Sad and heavy, I was returning to the village. Be- tween me and the church spire, rose a little hill, and on its summit a group of trees, insulated from all the rest of the wood, with their own share of radiance hovering on them from the west, and their own soli tary shadow falling to the east. ‘The afternoon being far declined, the sunshine was almost pensive, and the shade almost cheerful; glory and gloom were mingled in the placid light; as if the spirits of the Day and Evening had met in friendship under those trees, and found themselves akin. I was admiring the picture, when the shape of a young girl emerged from behind the clump of oaks. My heart knew her; it was the THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. 297 Vision ; but so distant and ethereal did she seem, so unmixed with earth, so imbued with the pensive glory of the spot where she was standing, that my spirit sunk within°me, sadder than before. How could I ever reach her ? While I gazed, a sudden shower came pattering down upon the leaves. In a moment the air was full of brightness, each rain-drop catching a portion of sunlight as it fell, and the whole gentle shower ap- pearing like a mist, just substantial enough to bear the burthen of radiance. A rainbow, vivid as Niag- ara’s, was painted in the air. Its southern limb came down before the group of trees, and enveloped the fair Vision, as if the hues of Heaven were the only garment for her beauty. When the rainbow van- ished, she, who had seemed a part of it, was no longer there. Was her existence absorbed in na- ture’s loveliest phenomenon, and did her pure frame dissolve away in the varied light? Yet, I would not despair of her return ; for, robed in the rainbow, she was the emblem of Hope. Thus did the vision leave me; and many a doleful day succeeded to the parting moment. By the spring, and in the wood, and on the hill, and through the vil- lage; at dewy sunrise, burning noon, and at that magic hour of sunset, when she had vanished from my sight, I sought her, but in vain. Weeks came and went, months rolled away, and she appeared not in them. I imparted my mystery to none, but wan- dered to-and-fro, or sat in solitude, like one that had caught a glimpse of Heaven, and could take no more 298 THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. joy on earth. I withdrew into an inner world, where my thoughts lived and breathed, and the Vision in the midst of them. Without intending it, Iybecame at once the author and hero of a romance, conjuring up rivals, imagining events, the actions of others and my own, and experiencing every change of passion, till jealousy and despair had their end in bliss. Oh, had I the burning fancy of my early youth, with man- hood’s colder gift, the power of expression, your hearts, sweet ladies, should flutter at my tale ! In the middle of January, I was summoned home. The day before my departure, visiting the spots which had been hallowed by the Vision, I found that the spring had a frozen bosom, and nothing but the snow and a glare of winter sunshine, on the hill of the rain- bgw. ‘Let me hope,’ thought I, ‘ or my heart will be as icy as the fountain, and the whole world as deso- late as this snowy hill.’ Most of the day was spent in preparing for the journey, which was to commence at four o’clock the next morning. About an hour after supper, when all was in readiness, I descended from my chamber to the sitting-room, to take leave of the old clergyman and his family, with whom I had been an inmate. A gust of wind blew out my lamp as I passed through the entry. According to their invariable custom, so pleasant a one when the fire blazes cheerfully, the family were sitting in the parlor, with no other light than what came from the hearth. As the good clergy- man’s scanty stipend compelled him to use all sorts of economy, the foundation of his fires was always THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. 299 a large heap of tan, or ground bark, which would smoulder away, from morning till night, with a dull warmth and no flame. This evening the heap of tan was newly put on, and surmounted with three sticks of red oak, ‘full of moisture, and a few pieces of dry pine, that had not yet kindled. - There was no light, except the little that came sullenly from two half-burnt brands, without even glimmering on the andirons. But I knew the position of the old minister’s arm-chair, and also where his wife sat, with her knitting-work, and how to avoid his two daughters, one a stout country lass, and the other a consumptive girl. Groping through the gloom, I found my own place next to that of the son, a learned collegian, who had come home to keep school in the village during the winter vacation. I noticed that there was less room than usual, to-night, between the collegian’s chair and mine. As people are always taciturn in the dark, not a word was said for some time after my entrance. No- thing broke the stillness but the regular click of the matron’s knitting-needles. At times, the fire threw out a brief and dusky gleam, which twinkled on the old man’s glasses, and hovered doubtfully round our circle, but was far too faint to portray the individu- als who composed it. Were we uot like ghosts ? Dreamy as the scene was, might it not be a type of the mode in which departed people, who had known and loved each other here, would hold communion in eternity? We were aware of each other’s presence, 300 THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. not by sight, nor sound, nor touch, but by an inward consciousness. Would it not be so among the dead ? The silence was interrupted by the consumptive daughter, addressing a remark to some one in the circle, whom she called Rachel. Her tremulous and decayed accents were answered by a single word, but in a voice that made me start, and bend towards the spot whence it had proceeded. Had I ever heard that sweet, low tone? If not, why did it rouse up so many old recollections, or mockeries of such, the shadows of things familiar, yet unknown, and fill my mind with confused images of her features who had spoken, though buried in the gloom of the parlor ? Whom had my heart recognised, that it throbbed so? I listened, to catch her gentle breathing, and strove, by the intensity of my gaze, to picture forth a shape where none was visible. Suddenly, the dry pine caught; the fire blazed up with a ruddy glow; and where the darkness had been, there was she —the Vision of the Fountain! A spirit of radiance only, she had vanished with the rainbow, and appeared again in the fire-light, perhaps to flicker with the blaze, and be gone. Yet, her cheek was rosy and life-like, and her features, in the bright warmth of the room, were even sweeter and tenderer than my recollection of them. She knew me! The mirthful expression that had laughed in her eyes and dimpled over her countenance, when I beheld her faint beauty in the fountain, was laughing and dimpling there now. One moment, our glance THE VISION OF THE FOUNTAIN. 301 mingled—the next, down rolled the heap of tan upon the kindled wood—and darkness snatched away that Daughter of the Light, and gave her back to me no more ! Fair ladies, there is nothing more to tell. Must the simple mystery be revealed, then, that Rachel was the daughter of the village "Squire, and had left home for a boarding-school, the morning after | arrived, and returned the day before my departure ? If I transformed her to an angel, it is what every youthful lover does for his mistress. Therein con- sists the essence of my story. But, slight the change, sweet maids, to make angels of yourselves ! | Be lane ea ; ae FANCY’S SHOW BOX. FANCY’S SHOW BOX. A MORALITY. Waat is Guilt? A stain upon the soul. And it is a point of vast interest, whether the soul may con- tract such stains, in all their depth and flagrancy, from deeds which may have been plotted and re- solved upon, but which, physically, have never had existence. Must the fleshly hand, and visible frame of man, set its seal to the evil designs of the soul, in order to give them their entire validity against the sinner? Or, while none but crimes perpetrated are cognizable before an earthly tribunal, will guilty thoughts — of which guilty deeds are no more than shadows — will these draw down the full weight of a condemning sentence, in the supreme court of eter- nity? In the solitude of a midnight chamber, or in a desert, afar from men, or in a church, while the body is kneeling, the soul may pollute itself even with those crimes, which we are accustomed to VOL. I. 20 306 FANCY’S SHOW BOX. deem altogether carnal. If this be true, it is a fear- ful truth. Let us illustrate the subject by an imaginary ex- ample. A venerable gentleman, one Mr. Smith, who had long been regarded as a pattern of moral excellence, was warming his aged blood with a glass or two of generous wine. His children being gone © forth about their worldly business, and his grand- children at school, he sat alone, in a deep, luxurious arm-chair, with his feet beneath a richly carved ma- hogany table. Some old people have a dread of sol- itude, and when better company may not be had, re- joice even to hear the quiet breathing of a babe, asleep upon the carpet. But Mr. Smith, whose sil- ver hair was the bright symbol of a life unstained, except by such spots as are inseparable from human nature, he had no need of a babe to protect him by its purity, nor of a grown person, to stand between him and his own soul.. Nevertheless, either Man- hood must converse with Age, or Womanhood must soothe him with gentle cares, or Infancy must sport around his chair, or his thoughts will stray into the misty region of the past, and the old man be chill and sad. Wine will not always cheer him. Such might have been the case with Mr. Smith, when, through the brilliant medium of his glass of old Ma- deria, he beheld three figures entering the room. These were Fancy, who had assumed the garb and aspect of an itinerant showman, with a box of pic- tures on her back ; and Memory, in the likeness of a clerk, with a pen behind her ear, an ink-horn at FANCY’S SHOW BOX. 307 her button-hole, and a huge manuscript volume be- neath her arm ; and lastly, behind the other two, a person shrouded in a dusky mantle, which concealed both face and form. But Mr. Smith had a shrewd idea that it was Conscience. How kind of Fancy, Memory, and Conscience, to visit the old gentleman, just as he was beginning to imagine that the wine had neither so bright a sparkle, nor so excellent a flavor, as when himself and the liquor were less aged! Through the dim length of the apartment, where crimson curtains muflled the glare of sunshine, and created a rich obscurity, the three guests drew near the silver-haired old man. Memory, with a finger between the leaves of her huge volume, placed herself at his right hand. Con- science, with her face still hidden in the dusky man- tle, took her station on the left, so as to be next his heart; while Fancy set down her picture-box upon the table, with the magnifying glass convenient to his eye. We can sketch merely the outlines of two or three, out of the many pictures, which at the pull- ing of a string, successively peopled the box with the semblances of living scenes. One was a moonlight picture ; in the back ground, a lowly dwelling; and in front, partly shadowed by a tree, yet besprinkled with flakes of radiance, two youthful figures, male and‘female. The young man stood with folded arms, a haughty smile upon his lip, and a gleam of triumph in his eye, as he glanced downward at the kneeling girl. She was almost prostrate at his feet, evidently sinking under a weight ? 308 FANCY’S SHOW BOX. of shame and anguish, which hardly allowed her to lift her clasped hands in supplication. Her eyes she could not lift. But neither her agony, nor the lovely features on which it was depicted, nor the slender grace of the form which it convulsed, appeared to soften the obduracy of the young man. He was the personification of triumphant scorn. Now, strange to say, as old Mr. Smith peeped through the magni- fying glass, which made the objects start out from the canvas with magical deception, he began to recognise the farm-house, the tree, and both the figures of the picture. The young man, in times long past, had often met his gaze within the looking- glass ; the girl was the very image of his first love — his cottage-love— his Martha Burroughs! Mr. Smith was scandalized. ‘Oh, vile and slanderous picture!’ he exclaims. ‘ When have I triumphed over ruined innocence ? Was not Martha wedded, in her teens, to David Tomkins, who won her girlish love, and long enjoyed her affection as a wife? And ever since his death, she has lived a reputable wi- dow!’ Meantime, Memory was turning over the leaves of her volume, rustling them to and fro with uncertain fingers, until, among the earlier pages, she found one which had reference to this picture. She reads it, close to the old gentleman’s ear; it is a record merely of sinful thought, which never was embodied in an act ; but, while Memory is reading, Conscience unveils her face, and strikes a dagger to the heart of Mr. Smith. Though not a death-blow, the torture was extreme. FANCY’S SHOW BOX. 309 The exhibition proceeded. One after another, Fan- ° cy displayed her pictures, all of which appeared to have been painted by some malicious artist, on pur- pose to vex Mr. Smith. Not a shadow of proof could have been adduced, in any earthly court, that he was guilty of the slightest of those sins which were thus made to stare him in the face. In one scene, there was a table set out, with several bottles, and glasses half filled with wine, which threw back the dull ray of an expiring lamp. There had been mirth and revelry, until the hand of the clock stood just at mid- night, when Murder stept between the boon compan- ions. A young man had fallen on the floor, and lay stone dead, with a ghastly wound crushed into his temple, while over him, with a delirium of mingled rage and horror in his countenance, stood the youth- ful likeness of Mr. Smith. The murdered youth wore the features of Edward Spencer! ‘ What does this rascal of a painter mean?’ cries Mr. Smith, pro- voked beyond all patience. ‘Edward Spencer was my earliest and dearest friend, true to me as I to him, through more than half a century. Neither I, nor any other, ever murdered him. Was he not alive within five years, and did he not, in token of our long friendship, bequeath me his gold-headed cane, and a mourning ring?’ Again had Memory been turning over her volume, and fixed at length upon so confused. a page, that she surely must have scribbled it when she was tipsy. The purport was, however, that, while Mr. Smith and Edward Spencer were heating their young blood with wine, a quarrel had flashed up be- 310 . FANCY’S SHOW BOX. tween them, and Mr. Smith, in deadly wrath, had flung a bottle at Spencer’s head. ‘True, it missed its aim, and merely smashed a looking-glass; and the next morning, when the incident was imperfectly remem- bered, they had shaken hands with a hearty laugh. Yet, again, while Memory was reading, Conscience unveiled her face, struck a dagger to the heart of Mr. Smith, and quelled his remonstrance: with her iron _ frown. The pain was quite excruciating. Some of the pictures had been painted with so doubtful a touch, and in colors so faint and pale that the subjects could barely be conjectured. A dull, semi-transparent mist had been thrown over the sur- face of the canvas, into which the figures seemed to vanish, while the eye sought most earnestly to fix them. But, in every scene, however dubiously por- trayed, Mr. Smith was invariably haunted by his own lineaments, at various ages, as in a dusty mirror. Af- ter poring several minutes over one of these blurred and almost indistinguishable pictures, he began to see, that the painter had intended to represent him, now in the decline of life, as stripping the clothes from the backs of three half-starved children. ‘ Really, this puzzles me!’ quoth Mr. Smith, with the irony of conscious rectitude. ‘Asking pardon of: the painter, I pronounce him a fool, as well as a scandalous knave. A man of my standing in the world, to be robbing little children of their clothes! Ridiculous!’ — But while he spoke, Memory had searched her fatal volume, and found a page, which, with her sad, calm voice, she poured into his ear. It was not altogether inap- FANCY’s SHOW BOX. 311 plicable to the misty scene. It told how Mr. Smith had been grievously tempted, by many devilish soph- istries, on the ground of a legalquibble, to commence a lawsuit against three orphan children, joint heirs to a considerable estate. Fortunately, before he was quite decided, his claims had turned out nearly as de- void of law, as justice. As Memory ceased to read, Conscience again thrust aside her mantle, and would have struck her victim with the envenomed dagger, only that he struggled, and clasped his hands before his heart. Even then, however, he sustained an ugly gash. fre Why should we follow Fancy through the whole series of those awful pictures? Painted by an artist of wondrous power, and terrible acquaintance with the secret soul, they embodied the ghosts of all the never-perpetrated sins, that had glided through the life-time of Mr. Smith. And could such beings of cloudy fantasy, so near akin to nothingness, give valid evidence against him, at the day of judgment? Be that the case or not, there is reason to believe, that one truly penitential tear would have washed away each hateful picture, and left the canvas white as snow. But Mr. Smith, at a prick of Conscience too keen to be endured, bellowed aloud, with impatient agony, and suddenly discovered that his three guests were gone. There he sat alone, a silver-haired and highly venerated old man, in the rich gloom of the crimsoned-curtained room, with no box of pictures on the table, but only a decanter of most excellent Ma- deira. Yet his heart still seemed to fester with the venom of the dagger. 312 FANCY’S SHOW Box. Nevertheless, the unfortunate old gentleman might have argued the matter with Conscience, and alleged many reasons wherefore she should not smite him so pitilessly. Were we to take up his cause, it should be somewhat in the following fashion. A scheme of guilt, till it be put in execution, greatly resembles a train of incidents in a projected tale. The latter, in order to produce a sense of reality in the reader’s mind, must be conceived with. such proportionate strength by the author as to seem, in the glow of fancy, more like truth, past, present, or to come, than purely fiction. The prospective sinner, on the other hand, weaves his plot of crime, but seldom or never feels a perfect certainty that it will be executed. There is a dreaminess diffused about his thoughts ; in a dream, as it were, he strikes the death-blow into his victim’s heart, and starts to find an indelible blood- stain on his hand. Thus a novel-writer, or a drama- tist, in creating a villain of romance, and fitting him with evil deeds, and the villain of actual life, in pro- jecting crimes that will be perpetrated, may almost meet each other, half way between reality and fancy. It is not until the crime is accomplished, that guilt clenches its gripe upon the guilty heart and claims it for its own. Then, and not before, sin is actu- ally felt and acknowledged, and, if unaccompanied by repentance, grows a thousandfold more viru- lent by its self-consciousness. Be it considered, also, that men often over-estimate their capacity for evil. Ata distance, while its attendant circum- stances do not press upon their notice, and its re- FANCY’S SHOW BOX. aie sults are dimly seen, they can bear to contemplate it. They may take the steps which lead to crime, im- pelled by the same sort of mental action as in work- ing out a mathematical problem, yet be powerless with compunction, at the final moment. They knew not what deed it was, that they deemed themselves resolved to do. In truth, there is no such thing in man’s nature, as a settled and full resolve, either for good or evil, except at the very moment of execution. Let us hope, therefore, that all the dreadful conse- quences of sin will not be incurred, unless the act have set its seal upon the thought. Yet, with the slight fancy-work which we have framed, some sad and awful truths are interwoven. Man must not disclaim his brotherhood, even with the guiltiest, since, though his hand be clean, his heart has surely been polluted by the flitting phantoms of iniquity. He must feel, that, when he shall knock at the gate of Heaven, no semblance of an unspotted life can entitle him to entrance there. Penitence must kneel, and Mercy come from the footstool of the throne, or that golden gate will never open! oe 4 aLT pie : "Masi ntey Ww AhouR Hale aay nad betta waa! feo sseabel Ly A a DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. we FB Hat im DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. Tat very singular man, old Dr. Heidegger, once invited four venerable friends to meet him in his study. There were three white-bearded gentlemen, Mr. Medbourne, Colonel Killigrew, and Mr. Gas- coigne, and a withered gentlewoman, whose name was the widow Wycherly. They were all melan- choly old creatures, who had been unfortunate in life, and whose greatest misfortune it was, that they were not long ago in their graves. Mr. Medbourne, in the vigor of his age, had been a prosperous merchant, but had lost his all by a frantic speculation, and was now little better than a mendicant. Colonel Killigrew had wasted his best years, and his health and sub- stance, in the pursuit of sinful pleasures, which had given birth to a brood of pains, such as the gout, and divers other torments of soul and body. Mr. Gas- coigne was a ruined politician, a man of evil fame, or at least had been so, till time had buried him from 318 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. the knowledge of the present generation, and made him obscure instead of infamous. As for the Widow Wycherly, tradition tells us that she was a great beauty in her day ; but, for a long while past, she had lived in deep seclusion, on account of certain scandalous stories, which had prejudiced the gentry of the town against her. It is a circumstance worth mentioning, that each of these three old gentlemen, Mr. Medbourne, Colonel Killigrew, and Mr. Gascoigne, were early lovers of the Widow Wycherly, and had once been on the point of cutting each other’s throats for her sake. And, before proceeding farther, I will merely hint, that Dr. Heidegger and all his four guests were sometimes thought to be a little beside themselves ; as is not unfrequently the case with old people, when worried either by present troubles or woful recollec- tions. ) ‘ My dear old friends,’ said Dr. Heidegger, motion- ing them to be seated, ‘1 am desirous of your assist- ance in one of those little experiments with which I amuse myself here in my study.’ If all stories were true, Dr. Heidegger’s study must have been a very curious place. It was a dim, old- fashioned chamber, festooned with cobwebs, and be- sprinkled with antique dust. Around the walls stood several oaken bookcases, the lower shelves of which were filled with rows of gigantic folios, and black- letter quartos, and the upper with little parchment covered duodecimos. Over the central bookcase was a bronze bust of Hippocrates, with which, according to some authorities Dr. Heidegger was accustomed to DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 319 hold consultations, in all difficult cases of his practice. In the obscurest corner of the room stood a tall and narrow oaken closet, with its door ajar, within which doubtfully appeared a skeleton. Between two of the bookcases hung a looking-glass, presenting its high and dusty plate within a tarnished gilt frame. Among many wonderful stories related of this mirror, it was fabled that the spirits of all the doctor’s deceased pa- tients dwelt within its verge, and would stare him in the face whenever he looked thitherward. The op- posite side of the chamber was ornamented with the full-length portrait of a young lady, arrayed in the faded magnificence of silk, satin, and brocade, and with a visage as faded as her dress. Above half a century ago, Dr. Heidegger had been on the point of marriage with this young lady ; but, being affected with some slight disorder, she had swallowed one of her lover’s prescriptions, and died on. the bridal eve- ning. ‘The greatest curiosity of the study remains to be mentioned ; it was a ponderous folio volume, bound in black leather, with massive silver clasps. There were no letters on the back, and nobody could tell the title of the book. But it was well known to be a book of magic; and once, when a chambermaid had lifted it, merely to brush away the dust, the skeleton had rattled in its closet, the picture of the young lady had stepped one foot upon the floor, and several ghastly faces had peeped forth from the mirror; while the _ brazen head of Hippocrates frowned, sind said — ‘Forbear !” Such was Dr.’Heidegger’s study. On the summer 320 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. afternoon of our tale, a small round table, as black as ebony, stood in the centre of the room, sustaining a cut-glass vase, of beautiful form and elaborate work- manship. The sunshine came through the window, between the heavy festoons of two faded damask cur- tains, and fell directly across this vase ; so that a mild splendor was reflected from it on the ashen visages of the five old people who sat around. Four cham- paigne glasses were also on the table. ‘My dear old friends,’ repeated Dr. Heidegger, ‘may I reckon on your aid in performing an exceed- ingly curious experiment ? ’ Now Dr. Heidegger was a very strange old gentle- man, whose eccentricity had become the nucleus for a thousand fantastic stories. Some of these fables, to my shame be it spoken, might possibly be traced back to mine own veracious self; and if any passages of the present tale should startle the reader’s faith, I must be content to bear the stigma of a fiction-monger. When the doctor’s four guests heard him talk of his proposed experiment, they anticipated nothing more wonderful than the murder of a mouse in an air-pump, or the examination of a cobweb by the microscope, or some similar nonsense, with which he was constantly in the habit of pestering his intimates. But without waiting for a reply, Dr. Heidegger hobbled across the chamber, and returned with the same ponderous folio, bound in black leather, which common report affirmed to be a book of magic. Undoing the silver clasps, he opened the volume, and took from among its black- | letter pages a rose, or what was once a rose, though DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 321 now the green leaves and crimson petals had assumed one brownish hue, and the ancient flower seemed ready to crumble to dust in the doctor’s hands. * This rose,’ said Dr. Heidegger, with a sigh, ¢ this same withered and:crumbling flower, blossomed five- and-fifty years ago. It was given me by Sylvia Ward, _ whose portrait hangs yonder ; and I meant to wear it in my bosom at our eae Five-and-fifty years it has been treasured Dean the leaves of this old volume. Now, would you deem it possible that this rose of half a century could ever bloom again ?’ * Nonsense !” said the Widow Wycherly, with a peevish toss of her head. ‘ You might as well ask whether an old woman’s wrinkled face could ever bloom again.’ ‘See!’ answered Dr. Heidegger. He uncovered the vase, and threw the faded rose into the water which it contained. At first, it lay lightly on the surface of the fluid, appearing to imbibe none of its moisture. Soon, however, a singular change began to be visible. The crushed and dried petals stirred, and assumed a deepening tinge of crim- son, as if the flower were reviving from a death-like slumber ; the slender stalk and twigs of foliage be- came green ; and there was the rose of half a cen- tury, looking as fresh as when Sylvia Ward had first given it to her lover. It was scarcely full-blown ; for some of its delicate red leaves curled modestly around its moist bosom, within which two or three dew-drops were sparkling. ‘ That is certainly a very pretty deception,’ said the VOL. I. 21 3822 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. doctor’s friends; carelessly, however, for they had witnessed greater miracles at a conjurer’s show : * pray how was it effected ?’ ‘ Did you never hear of the ** Fountain of Youth? ”’ asked Dr. Heidegger, ‘ which Ponce De Leon, the Spanish adventurer, went in ——— of, two or three centuries ago?’ ‘But did Ponce De Leon ever find it?’ said the Widow Wycherly. ‘No,’ answered Dr. Heidegger, ‘for he never sought it in the right place. ‘The famous Fountain of Youth, if I am rightly informed, is situated in the southern part of the Floridian peninsula, not far from Lake Macaco. Its source is overshadowed by several gigantic magnolias, which, though numberless centu- ries old, have been kept as fresh as violets, by the virtues of this wonderful water. An acquaintance of mine, knowing my curiosity in such maters, has sent me what you see in the vase.’ ‘Ahem !” said Colonel Killigrew, who believed not a word of the doctor’s story : ‘and what may be the effect of this fluid on the human frame ?’ ‘You shall judge for yourself, my dear colonel,’ re- plied Dr. Heidegger; ‘and all of you, my respected friends, are welcome to so much of this admirable fluid, as may restore to you the bloom of youth. For my own part, having had much trouble in grow- ing old, I am in no hurry to grow young again. With your permission, therefore, I will merely watch the progress of the experiment.’ While he spoke, Dr. Heidegger had been filling the DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 323 four champaigne glasses with the water of the Foun- tain of Youth. It was apparently impregnated -with an effervescent gas, for little bubbles were continually ascending from the depths of the glasses, and burst- ing in silvery spray at the surface. As the liquor diffused a pleasant perfume, the old people doubted not that it possessed cordial and comfortable proper- ties ; and, though utter skeptics as to its rejuvenescent power, they were inclined to swallow it at once. But Dr. Heidegger besought them to stay a moment. Before you drink, my respectable old friends,’ said he, ‘it would be well that, with the experience of a life-time to direct you, you should draw up a few general rules for you guidance, in passing a second time through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be, if, with your peculiar advan- tages, you should not become patterns of virtue and wisdom to all the young people of the age!’ The doctor’s four venerable friends made him no answer, except by a feeble and tremulous laugh; so very ridiculous was the idea, that, knowing how closely repentance treads behind the steps of error, they should ever go astray again. ‘Drink, then,’ said the doctor, bowing: ‘I rejoice that I have so well selected the subjects of my ex- periment.’ With palsied hands, they raised the glasses to their lips. The liquor, if it really possessed such virtues as Dr. Heidegger imputed to it, could not have been bestowed on four human beings who needed it more wofully. They looked as if they had never known 324 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. what youth or pleasure was, but had been the offspring of Nature’s dotage, and always the gray, decrepit, sapless, miserable creatures, who now sat stooping round the doctor’s table, without life enough in their souls or bodies to be animated even by the prospect of growing young again. ‘They drank off the water, and replaced their glasses on the table. Assuredly there was an almost immediate improve- ment in the aspect of the party, not unlike what might have been produced by a glass of generous wine, together with a sudden glow of cheerful sunshine, brightening over all their visages at once. ‘There was a healthful suffusion on their cheeks, instead of the ashen hue that had made them look so corpse-like. They gazed at one another, and fancied that some magic- power had really begun to smooth away the deep and sad inscriptions which Father Time had been so long engraving on their brows. ‘The Widow Wycherly adjusted her cap, for she felt almost like a woman again. ‘Give us more of this wondrous water!” cried they, eagerly. ‘We are younger— but we are still too old! Quick— give us more!’ ‘Patience, patience!’ quoth Dr. Heidegger, who sat watching the experiment, with philosophic cool- ness. ‘You have been a long time growing old. Surely, you might be content to grow young in half an hour! But the water is at your service.’ Again he filled their glasses with the liquor of youth, enough of which still remained in the vase to turn half the old people in the city to the age of their DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 925 own grandchildren. While the bubbles were yet sparkling on the brim, the doctor’s four guests snatched their glasses from the table, and swallowed the contents at a single gulp. Was it delusion! Even while’ the draught was passing down their throats, it seemed to have wrought a change on their whole systems. Their eyes grew clear and bright; a dark shade deepened among their silvery locks ; they sat around the table, three gentlemen, of middle age, and a woman, hardly beyond her buxom prime. ‘My dear widow, you are charming!’ cried Colo- nel Killigrew, whose eyes had been fixed upon her face, while the shadows of age were flitting from it like darkness from the crimson daybreak. The fair widow knew, of old, that Colonel Killi- grew’s compliments were not always measured by sober truth; so she started up and ran to the mirror, still dreading that the ugly visage of an old woman would meet her gaze. Meanwhile, the three gentle- men behaved in such a manner, as proved that the water of the Fountain of Youth possessed some in- toxicating qualities ; unless, indeed, their exhilaration of spirits were merely a lightsome dizziness, caused by the sudden removal of the weight of years. Mr. Gascoigne’s mind seemed to run on political topics, but whether relating to the past, present, or future, could not easily be determined, since the same ideas and phrases have been in vogue these fifty years... Now he rattled forth full-throated sentences about patriotism, national glory, and the people's right ; now he muttered some perilous stuff or other, in a sly and 21* 7 > “ve > 326 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. doubtful whisper, so cautiously that even his own conscience could scarcely catch the secret; and now, again, he spoke in measured accents, and a deeply deferential tone, as if a royal ear were listening to his well-turned periods. Colonel Killigrew all this time had been trolling forth a jolly bottle-song, and ringing his glass in symphony with the chorus, while his eyes wandered toward the buxom figure of the Widow Wycherly. On the other side of the table, Mr. Medbourne was involved in a calculation of dol- lars and cents, with which was strangely intermingled a project for supplying the East Indies with ice, by harnessing a team of whales to the polar icebergs. As for the Widow Wycherly, she stood before the mirror curtseying and simpering to her own image, and greeting it as the friend whom she loved better than all the world beside. She thrust her face close to the glass, to see whether some long-remembered wrinkle or crow’s-foot had indeed vanished. She ex- amined whether the snow had so entirely melted from her hair, that the venerable cap could be safely thrown aside. At last, turning briskly away, she came with a sort of dancing step to the table. ‘My dear old doctor,’ cried she, ‘ pray favor me with another glass !” ‘Certainly, my dear madam, certainly!’ replied the complaisant doctor ; ‘see! I have already filled the glasses.’ : : There, in fact, stood the four glasses, brimful of this wonderful water, the delicate spray of which, as it effervesced from the surface, resembled the tremu- DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 827 lous glitter of diamonds. It was now so nearly sun- set, that the chamber had grown duskier than ever ; but a mild and moon-like splendor gleamed from within the vase, and rested alike on the four guests, and on the doctor’s venerable figure. He sat in a high-backed, elaborately-carved, oaken arm-chair, with a gray dignity of aspect that might have well be- fitted that very Father Time, whose power had never been disputed, save by this fortunate company. Even while quaffing the third draught of the Fountain of Youth, they were almost awed by the expression of his mysterious visage. But, the next moment, the exhilarating gush of young life shot through their veins. They were now in the happy prime of youth. Age, with its misera- ble train of cares, and sorrows, and diseases, was re- membered only as the trouble of a dream, from which they had joyously awoke. The fresh gloss of the soul, so early lost, and without which the world’s successive scenes had been but a gallery of faded pictures, again threw its enchantment over all their prospects. ‘They felt like new-created beings, in a new-created universe. ‘ We are young! We are young!” they cried ex- ultingly. Youth, like the extremity of age, had effaced the strongly marked characteristics of middle life, and mutually assimilated them all. They were a group of merry youngsters, almost maddened with the ex- uberant frolicksomeness of their years. The most singular effect of their gaiety was an impulse to mock 328 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. the infirmity and decrepitude of which they had so lately been the victims. They laughed loudly at their old-fashioned attire, the wide-skirted coats and flapped waistcoats of the young men, and the ancient cap and gown of the blooming girl. One limped across the floor, like a gouty grandfather ; one set a pair of spectacles astride of his nose and pretended to pore over the blackletter pages of the book of magic ; a third seated himself in an arm-chair, and strove to imitate the venerable dignity of Dr. Heidegger. Then all shouted mirthfully, and leaped about the room. The Widow Wycherly —if so fresh a damsel could be called a widow — tripped up to the doctor’s chair, with a mischievous merriment in her rosy face. ‘Doctor, you dear old soul,’ cried she, ‘ get up and dance with me!’ And then the four young people laughed louder than ever, to think what a queer fig- ure the poor old doctor would cut. ‘Pray excuse me,’ answered the doctor quietly. ‘T am old and rheumatic, and my dancing days were over long ago. But either of these gay young gen- tlemen will be glad of so pretty a partner.’ ‘Dance with me, Clara!’ cried Colonel Killigrew. ‘No, no, I will be her partner!’ shouted Mr. Gas- coigne. ‘She promised me her hand, fifty years ago!” ex- claimed Mr. Medbourne. | They all gathered round her. One caught both her hands in his passionate grasp — another threw his arm about her waist — the third buried his hand among the glossy curls that clustered beneath the widow’s DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 329 cap. Blushing, panting, struggling, chiding, laughing, her warm breath fanning each of their faces by turns, she strove to disengage herself, yet still remained in their triple embrace. Never was there a livelier pic- ture of youthful rivalship, with bewitching beauty for the prize. Yet, by a strange deception, owing to the duskiness of the chamber, and the antique dresses which they still wore, the tall mirror is said to have reflected the figures of the three old, gray, withered grandsires, ridiculously contending for the skinny ug- liness of a shriveled grandam. But they were young: their burning passions proved them so. Inflamed to madness by the coquet- ry of the girl-widow, who neither granted nor quite withheld her favors, the three rivals-began to inter- change threatening glances. Still keeping hold of the fair prize, they grappled fiercely at one another’s throats. As they struggled to and fro, the table was overturned, and the vase dashed into a thousand frag- ments. ‘The precious Water of Youth flowed in a bright stream across the floor, moistening the wings of a butterfly, which, grown old in the decline of summer, had alighted there to die. The insect flut- tered lightly through the chamber, and settled on the snowy head of Dr. Heidegger. ‘Come, come, gentlemen!—come, Madam Wy- cherly,’ exclaimed the doctor, ‘I really must protest against this riot.’ They stood still, and shivered ; for it seemed as if gray ‘Time were calling them back from their sunny youth, far down into the chill and darksome vale of 330 DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. years. They looked at old Dr. Heidegger, who sat in his carved arm-chair, holding the rose of half a century, which he had rescued from among the frag- ments of the shattered vase. At the motion of his hand, the four rioters resumed their seats; the more readily, because their violent exertions had wearied them, youthful though they were. ‘ My poor Sylvia’s rose!’ ejaculated Dr. Heideg- ger, holding it in the light of the sunset clouds: ‘ it appears to be fading again.’ And so it was. Even while the party were look- ing at it, the flower continued to shrivel up, till it be- came as dry and fragile as when the doctor had first thrown it into the vase. He shook off the few drops of moisture which clung to its petals. ‘T love it as well thus, as in its dewy freshness,’ observed he, pressing the withered rose to his with- ered lips. While he spoke, the butterfly fluttered down from the doctor’s snowy head, and fell upon the floor. His guests shivered again. A strange chillness, whether of the body or spirit they could not tell, was creeping gradually over them all. They gazed at one another, and fancied that each fleeting moment snatched away a charm, and left a deepening furrow where none had been before. Was it an illusion? Had the changes of a life-time been crowded into so brief a space, and were they now four aged people, sitting with their old friend, Dr. Heidegger ? ‘Are we grown old again, so soon!’ cried they, dolefully. DR. HEIDEGGER’S EXPERIMENT. 331 In truth, they had. The Water of Youth possessed merely a virtue more transient than that of wine. The delirium which it created had effervesced away. Yes! they were old again. With a shuddering im- pulse, that showed her a woman still, the widow clasped her skinny hands before her face, and wished that the coffin-lid were over it, since it could be no longer beautiful. ‘ Yes, friends, ye are old again,’ said Dr. Heideg- ger; ‘and Jo! the Water of Youth is all lavished on the ground. Well—I bemoan it not; for if the fountain gushed at my very door-step, I would not stoop to bathe my lips in it — no, though its delirium were for years instead of moments. Such is the les- son ye have taught me !’ But the doctor’s four friends had taught no such lesson to themselves. They resolved forthwith to make a pilgrimage to Florida, and quaff at morning, neon, and night, from the Fountain of Youth. END OF VOL. I. ; ~ Pi Belege ie LI, oe ie ae Remy ye inet Hye