L I E) RAR.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N IVLR.SITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS 
 
 v.\
 
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 BY THE AUTHOK OF 
 
 EMILIA WYNDHAM," "THE WILMINGTONS," &c. 
 
 ' The Word dwelt with me^ and its inward light. 
 By anguish aided, and adversity, 
 Wrought in my heart an inward change entire.' 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 HENRY C L B U R N, PUBLISHER, 
 
 GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 
 1851.
 
 LONDOX : 
 PRINTED BY HARRISON AXD SON, 
 
 ST. marten's lane.
 
 8S3 
 
 \A"b55Jbu 
 
 V, 1 
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ^' jMust I then forward only look at death? 
 Backward I turn mine eye^ and find him there. 
 Man is a self-survivor every year.'' 
 
 The enterprise I am about to undertake is 
 the most difficult of any one I have as yet 
 attempted, and possibly to the mere novel rea- 
 der may prove the least interesting and attrac- 
 tive. 
 
 But as Milton, in the deep seriousness of an 
 earnest mind, invoked for aid before he com- 
 menced his divine song — not the muses who 
 
 VOL. J. B
 
 2 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 preside over the fine arts ; not tliose powers of 
 grace and beauty which fascinate the imagina- 
 tion of mankind, but that heayenlj influence, 
 whose still small voice persuades the reason and 
 strikes the inner heart. That spirit, 
 
 " Which on the secret top 
 Of Oreb or of Sinai did inspire 
 That Shepherd who first taught the chosen seed, 
 Iti the beginning, how the Heavens and Earth 
 Rose out of Chaos." 
 
 So I, in my humble, but I trust as honest 
 purpose, invoke the same high power for assist- 
 ance in the delineation of a jet more mighty 
 work, than that of reducing the rude voices of 
 chaos into harmony. — The work by which the 
 chaos of the inner soul — its dark contention of 
 warring tempers and undisciplined desires is 
 reduced to order ; and the new man, in his 
 beautiful perfection of moral symmetery, issues 
 forth from amid the confused strife of thought 
 and passion. Springing into fresh being under 
 the influences of the great spiritual power ; 
 that " Son of Righteousness,'' who hath risen 
 upon this earth " with healing on his wings." 
 A mighty task, indeed.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 3 
 
 Shall my attempt, in all liumility, to perform 
 this, be rewarded by the affectionate indul- 
 gence which I have hitherto met with '? That 
 sympathy of simple, inoenuous hearts, which 
 has cheered me through tasks, executed to 
 the best of my feeble powers ; though in a 
 manner so far, far below what was required by 
 the adventurous sone:. 
 
 It is a rather gloomy evening, and the sun 
 has just set in that somewhat solemn pomp of 
 purple and gold, when dark heavy lowering 
 clouds give to the western sky a sublime 
 expression of majestic seriousness. Seeming as 
 if the dark curtains of the heavens were falling 
 round the departing luminary, in order to typify 
 to the imagination that awful day when they 
 shall close over his beams for ever. 
 
 It was now twilight, and the majestic trees 
 which hang over the beautiful lake in Kensing- 
 ton Gardens, rose darkly against the soft sky, 
 in which from time to ime, as if summoned to 
 
 B 2
 
 4 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 their watches of th.e ni<;ht, one star after 
 anotlier began faintly to appear. 
 
 The banks upon the sides of the water which 
 are so beautifully shaded by those magnifi- 
 cent trees, were silent and deserted. Not a 
 creature was to be seen, where such numbers 
 of gaily dressed women and lovely children, 
 in all their bright fantastic attire, making 
 them to me look like troops of Midsummer 
 night fairies, had been lately crowding. The 
 brilliant forms and colours which, like those of 
 tropical birds, had been glancing up and down 
 among the deep green had vanished. 
 
 All was solitary, silent, calm, and shadowy. 
 Majestic, almost awful was the dark shado\7 in 
 its deep repose. 
 
 The hum of the great city, like the noise of 
 some vast distant waterfall, was heard, filling 
 the air of the night with its sound. Heard 
 at this distance, the confused murmur of this 
 immensity of human life and action is very 
 solemn. It w^as only now and then interrupted 
 by the sound of a bird among the leaves, 
 or of the w^nd gently sw^aying the branches ; 
 thus contrasting the soft voice of tender
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 5 
 
 but most expressive nature with tliat of the 
 rush and storm of human existence not far off. 
 I made use of the word deserted, in speaking 
 of the gardens at this moment, but thej were 
 not altogether deserted. 
 
 Do you see that man 1 He has been buried 
 in the thickets for some hours, as if he shunned 
 the face of eyerj living being; but now that 
 everybody is going away he comes forth, and 
 walks alone lost in deep thought, by the side 
 of the calm glassy lake, into which the stars 
 of evening are just beginning to gleam. 
 
 His life had been as one confused, striving, 
 tumultuous, hurried, darkened dream of death. 
 It had been a long tale, without much con- 
 nection or definite purpose; with little, per- 
 haps no preparation for the momentous ter- 
 mination. One day had succeeded to another 
 as one incident succeeds to another in an 
 ill-managed tale — directed to no apparent 
 purpose, or to no main purposes. Thus had 
 one day followed another in a long history 
 of many years. Not absolutely purposeless, 
 but unguided by principle, and without unity 
 of aim or action. But the force of circum-
 
 6 TIME, THE AVEXGEPw. 
 
 stances had at length pushed it to a crisis — 
 there had been a great catastrophe, and it was 
 just passed. 
 
 Not a mere catastrophe as regarded liis 
 outer circumstances ; such a yicissitude in the 
 vulgar exterior of life, and of ^yhich this man 
 had had his full share ; but that catastrophe, 
 that crisis in the inner man, which is indeed 
 the most solemn of things. When, as bj the 
 call of the last trumpet the dead are awakened 
 — the slumbering being within — the immortal 
 soul which dwells beneath this outward crust, 
 not only of flesh and sinews and muscles, 
 but of appetites, desire?, ambitions, and pas- 
 sions — is suddenly awakened. Starts as from 
 a death trance ; gazes astonished and appalled 
 at this summons to account, and, as if before 
 the last judgment-seat, takes a terrified glance 
 at its true condition. 
 
 Yes, awakens from the seeming, unsub- 
 stantial, futile shadows which had surrounded 
 it, to truth, reason, reality — to the perception 
 of that truth, that substantial reality, which lies 
 under these fleetinor things. 
 
 He had been aroused — dead as he had
 
 TIME, THE AVEI^GER. 7 
 
 seemed to be — dead, as to all appearance lie 
 utterly was — lost and buried under the secular 
 everj-daj material habits of material life, — 
 he had been awakened — suddenly, violently — 
 providentially, to the perception of a new life, 
 a better life — to the real new birth of another, 
 and a far superior man. 
 
 And how had this been done 1 
 
 Had he met with some grievous misfortune 1 
 Had he been ruined and seen the edifice of his 
 fortunes borne away by the hurricane ; and 
 reduced to dust like some frail building before 
 a mighty storm? Had he been crossed in 
 his dearest expectations'? Had death been at 
 his fireside 1 
 
 No, it was none of these. 
 
 He had, it is true, experienced the extremities 
 of fortune during his life, — he had known that 
 fearful thiuor ruin. But it was not thinojs of 
 such a nature which had possessed power to 
 shake his inner man. For he was of a firm 
 undaunted spirit ; and though he was proud 
 and ambitious, and understood well and loved 
 well the mighty power of gold ; he had
 
 8 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Bever suffered the stern philosoplij of his soul 
 to be the sL^.ve of it. 
 
 Had he lost those he loved? — Had his heart 
 been rent asunder? Every trembling fibre 
 •wrenched in two by the severance of those 
 affections which had entwined themselves 
 round the source of his being '? Was he now 
 experiencing those fond yearnings of the heart 
 after the lost, those vain longings which nothing 
 left in this world shall satisfy more ? 
 
 No. 
 
 He loved no one enougli, to be thus within 
 the power of the mighty hand of death. The 
 grim monster might gather in all the best 
 treasures of the earth into his graves ; this man 
 would have been little the poorer. Earth 
 held no such precious treasures for him. 
 
 Had he been surprised into committing 
 some heinous crime 1 Had a long course of 
 indifference to the higher principles of action ; 
 a course of selfish indulgence, and negligent 
 want of self-discipline, terminated in the hour 
 of sudden temptation in some hideous deed, — 
 a de ed at w^hich his own nature revolted 1
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 9 
 
 Siicli tilings have been. And the very enor- 
 mity of the tremendous crime into which, 
 under the influence of sudden temptation, a 
 man has been precipitated, has, in some cases, 
 bj the all-gracious provisions for the repentant 
 sinner, proved the verj^ means of rescuing tlie 
 victim in the eleventh hour. Awakening a 
 mighty overwhelming sense of remorse. And 
 thus, through the horrors of that most awful 
 of the dread powers of retribution, — i^eal 
 remo7^se — as through the purifying flames of a 
 heart-searching fire, has restored the polluted 
 victim to a purer being. 
 
 No such thing had taken place here. 
 
 He had committed no heinous crime ; no 
 action at which the man, when the passion of 
 the moment was over, recoils. He was not 
 one likely, perhaps, to be thus surprised 
 and overcome by sudden temptation. He was 
 of too firm, too determined a character to be 
 mastered by the sudden power of evil, any 
 more than by any other power. It is weak- 
 ness which yields to temptation ; it is weak- 
 ness that lies peculiarly exposed to tempt- 
 ation.
 
 10 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 This man was ueitlier wont to entertain 
 evil thoughts, nor wont to yield to evil 
 influences. There are few crimes which are 
 not follies, and he was proof against follj. 
 
 What was it, then, which had shaken this 
 stern, self-concentrated being, — this man proof 
 against follj or wickedness, against delusive 
 imaginations or fascinating passions '? What 
 was it that had shaken him to the very 
 centre 1 
 
 He had just escaped from most imminent 
 danger. 
 
 Ay, but he had done that before. He 
 had passed through the perils of a tremendous 
 shipwreck, and he had been saved. Yet there 
 even, 
 
 "When the ship hung far aloft, 
 High on the broken wave." 
 
 Even in that tremendous moment he had 
 not been so strongly moved as he was now. 
 His heart had not been invincibly turned to- 
 wards that Being 
 
 " Who was not slow to hear, 
 Nor impotent to save." 
 
 No, and when he found himself safe and
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 11 
 
 sound, alive and upon dry land, not even tlien, 
 had his own great deliverance, where nearly 
 twice five hundred men went down, awakened 
 in him any new sense, or turned his thoughts 
 in gratitude to that Power, that Providence 
 which had saved him. 
 
 When he emerged from the briny deep 
 w^hich had swallowed up his fellows, he just 
 took up life again with the same spirit, and 
 in the same indifference to all beyond it 
 w^hich had distinguished him before. His 
 eyes were still bent, like those of Mammon, 
 upon the golden floor of this great creation ; 
 his attention was still rivetted upon the 
 thino's of this world. His thoudits were never 
 once cast upwards; never once lifted towards 
 the blue serene of the heavenly vault, which 
 might have prefigured to him another and 
 better existence. 
 
 What then, was, this awful peril — more 
 awful than the raoioo; of the waters round 
 the struggling ship ? What was this dreadful 
 danger — more dreadful than deaths more 
 bitter than the grave 1 What was it that this 
 man had escaped ? .
 
 12 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 What was this danger? — the intense sense 
 of his deliverance from which shook his 
 inmost soul, — overwhelming, as with a 
 might J tide, every foregone system of 
 thought, — submerging, as by one vast wave, 
 every former habit of mind, — invading that 
 inner citadel of his heart, — breaking into 
 strongholds, — and rendering his once steadfast 
 soul, one chaos of confused and tempestuous 
 thought and feeling. Horror, as he thought 
 of the dangers escaped. Remorse, at the 
 recollection of sufferings he had occasioned; and 
 gratitude, a sense of overwhelming gratitude 
 for the agonies he had been spared. Grati- 
 tude — A sentiment, perhaps, never compre- 
 hended before ; and now directed he scarcely 
 knew to whom. 
 
 Terrific storm — Dark raging of the waters 
 in the pitchy night. 
 
 But what danger had he escaped I 
 
 What was this peril ; this agony from 
 which he had been spared ? 
 
 That of being the cause of the death of an 
 innocent man. 
 
 He had not sought that man's life by
 
 13 
 
 criminal means ; lie had done nothing in act 
 ^vhicli the most virtuous of human beings 
 might have thought himself, not only justified 
 in doing, but called upon to do. 
 
 ^Yhat, then, Avas it that smote him in so cruel 
 a manner, when he reflected upon the narro\y 
 chance by which he had escaped 1 
 
 Any man would have been horror-struck 
 at the idea of occasioning the death of another 
 under a mistaken impression. The man who 
 shoots an innocent person, whom he takes 
 in tlie night for a robber, suffers much ; the 
 man who has been the cause of brinojino- as 
 a criminal to trial and to death, one who 
 afterwards proves guiltless, must have moments 
 of indescribable distress and regret ; but at 
 the bar of conscience he stands acquitted, 
 and the death-agony of the soul he is spared. 
 
 And yet that was all as far as mere out- 
 ward appearances go, which had actually been 
 done. This man had firmly believed a person 
 to be guilty, and he had pursued him as 
 guilty — that was all. 
 
 Then, why did his conscience clamour so 
 importunately and cruelly?
 
 14 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 This was the reason : — 
 
 Because that power — that representative, 
 ever living, ever present within us, of an ever 
 living, ever present personal God without us — 
 a God who takes account and reckons with 
 his creatures, not only for actions, but for luill 
 — because this truth-speaking conscience told 
 him that this act of his — this bringing of a 
 criminal to punishment — had not been done 
 from a sense of justice. Not painfully, re- 
 luctantly, as a duty, a debt due to what was 
 right; but in the secret exultation of vin- 
 dictive joy. — Told him, that when he refused to 
 accept the restitution offered, and persisted in 
 pursuing a criminal to his doom, he had done it, 
 not under a persuasion of what obedience to the 
 laws of his country required — for he knew well 
 that such a consideration would have weighed 
 with him not one jot — but with the malignity 
 of bitter, unsparing, unpitying revenge. — That 
 the arm of the criminal law had not been 
 raised, as it ought alone to be raised, from a 
 regard to the preservation of society at large ; 
 but as a tremendous engine, which accident 
 had put into his hands, for gratifying a harsh,
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 15 
 
 unpitying temper; satisfjiDg the sense lie en- 
 tertained of heavy personal injury, and aveng- 
 ing a secret, private quarrel. 
 
 And in the pursuit of this bad object, he 
 had been at the very point of sacrificing an 
 innocent, an admirable, a most meritorious 
 man. 
 
 He had rushed blindly on, as it were, in the 
 dark, in pursuit of vengeance ; and he had 
 been about to plunge his poniard into an 
 innocent heart — into the heart of one of the 
 best of human beings. 
 
 The horror with which, in the court of jus- 
 tice, Mr. Oraiglethorpe had started up to pro- 
 claim the conviction which then first flashed 
 upon his mind, that Henry Wilmington was 
 innocent — the agony with which he had 
 rushed away, that he might not hear of the 
 fatal award — the tears of blood which seemed 
 to stream from his soul, at sight of those 
 two young women ; the one in all the majestic 
 calmness of her despair; the other lying life- 
 less in the arms of her friend — tlie murmur 
 that had buzzed in his ears, " His young wife 
 and sister" — Oh! these had been torturing, in- 
 deed! 
 
 I
 
 3 6 TIME, THE AYEXGER. 
 
 The succeeding week liad passed like a con- 
 fused, horrible dream — he recollected nothing 
 of it distinctl3\ 
 
 It had been spent in running about from 
 one place to another, from one person to 
 another ; in agonizing efforts to save that 
 which, through him, was about to perish — to 
 avert the doom he had himself called down. 
 
 Accident, providential accident, as we call 
 it — but we all know what we mean when we 
 call it so — had saved the victim. He had 
 not even the poor consolation of knowing that 
 this had been the result of his own exertions 
 or his own skill. It had been done for him, 
 entirely done for him, by a power over vvhich 
 he had not the slightest control. 
 
 He had escaped, as the man, in the often- 
 repeated story escaped, who walked over the 
 precipice in the night. He had been saved by 
 no effort of his own ; and he was ready to die 
 with the apprehension of the peril be had so 
 narrowly avoided. 
 
 The man now before us was, in spite of tlie 
 utter vulgarity of his actual life, one of very 
 strong feelings, — not lively, not easily called
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 17 
 
 forth, but -svlien called forth, acute in the 
 extreme. He had the stuff in him of which 
 better men are made. He had great sensi- 
 bility, and wherever we meet with sensibility, 
 we need never despair. We ought to value it 
 in the child, to respect it in the man, to for- 
 give its many aberrations, in favour of its 
 intrinsic and indestructible value. Let us 
 moderate, restrain, direct; but beware how 
 we attempt to stifle it ! 
 
 This man before us felt what had passed, in 
 a manner many men would not have been 
 capable of. Numbers of human beings go 
 through fearful passages of life, who want 
 the stuff to take strong impressions from what 
 they experience. They come out from such 
 trials much the same as they went in. This 
 one's nature was of a sort to take strong and 
 lasting impressions — not ductile, like wax, not 
 easily moulded was he; but, though of a hard, 
 he was made of a malleable metal. He could 
 be moulded by the force of a great circum- 
 stance, he could be softened in the furnace of 
 a searching fire ; and when once softened, and 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 18 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 once moulded, the generous material retained 
 the form it had taken. 
 
 This is the evening of the day upon which 
 Henry Wilmington's pardon was signed. 
 
 As soon as it was done, the tension of feel- 
 ing and thought, which had sustained Oraigle- 
 thorpe through the agonizing exertions and 
 agitating anxieties of the last ten days, gave 
 way. The whole strong system suddenly re- 
 laxed, and the man became weak and power- 
 less as a child. 
 
 I have heard, and I believe it, that the first 
 thing he did was to rush home to his lodging, 
 (since the change in his circumstances no 
 longer in that gloomy lane, but in a lightsome, 
 fashionable street,) to fling himself upon his 
 bed and burst into tears. 
 
 He lay weeping there some time. His tears 
 flowed like the stream of some river which has 
 been pent up for centuries, when the dam has 
 given way. They rolled forth like cataracts —
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 19 
 
 A sense of uDutterable relief — of gratitude, 
 which had no power of expression — no object 
 to which to direct itself, overwhelmed him. 
 His tears were the outburst of the overloaded, 
 pent-up heart, now suddenly set free. 
 
 When this paroxysm was over, half 
 ashamed and wondering at himself, he rose 
 from his bed and wiped his eves. He had 
 never had occasion before to wipe his eyes 
 since he was a schoolboy, I believe. He 
 looked round the gay, lightsome room in 
 which he was. You cannot think how pain- 
 fully the cheerful air of all that surrounded him 
 — the gaudy chintz of the bed — the French 
 paper covered with festoons of flowers and 
 dancing Cupids, — how the cheerful rattle of the 
 street at high noon, or rather high afternoon — 
 afi'ected him. To one emerging from the 
 darkness of the shadow of death, such things 
 are insupportable. These in the anguish and 
 hurry of the past ten days — these, like other 
 external things, had never struck him ; never 
 reached his senses, — but now they did ; and 
 with a contrast to the state of his feelings, 
 perfectly intolerable. 
 
 C 2
 
 20 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Had he been in his little, grim lodging in 
 the city ; the abode of the proud, wronged, 
 impoverished Craiglethorpe, he would have 
 been in his element. Its gloomy twilight at 
 mid-day, its dreary silence at high noon, would 
 have been congenial. He would have sat there 
 moodily brooding over what had happened — per- 
 haps, never have left the room for days. As it 
 was, he could not, and he would not stay where 
 he was. He rose hastily, pulled his hat over his 
 eyes, went stealthily in a sort of blind way 
 down stairs, out at the door, entered a cab, and 
 told the man to drive to the further end of 
 Kensington Gardens. 
 
 Arrived there he got out, paid the man, 
 entered the back part of the gardens, plunged 
 into the thickets, at that time, — I don't know 
 how it is now, — rarely visited by human foot ; 
 and here he wandered about all day. Some- 
 times he sat down seeming to muse, though, 
 in fact, he rather felt than thought, — some- 
 times he got up, and walked to and fro in 
 great agitation. 
 
 Into the sacred solitude of a stern and 
 proud heart, now in the agony of what I may
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 21 
 
 call its moral regeneration, I scarcely like to 
 intrude, — I do not like to exhibit the man you 
 have respected in spite of his faults, because 
 of his firm uncompromising nature, — in the 
 weakness of those death-throes of the soul. — 
 I shall not do it. — I shall go on to the evening 
 of that day, when this mighty storm having 
 subsided, he came down in the solitude of 
 the hour, to walk by the side of those quiet 
 waters, which responded to the calm which 
 had at last visited his soul. The sun was sink- 
 ing in his solemn grandeur, and twilight was 
 softly stealing over the grass and trees, whilst 
 the eyes of heaven were kindling, one by one, 
 over his head. The anguish and the agony ; 
 and the desperate apprehension of what might 
 have been, and of what he had escaped, had 
 gradually yielded to other thoughts. 
 
 First came the reflection that those two 
 women assuredly lived ; had survived the ter- 
 ror and the joy. Then that Henry was 
 actually saved, and that even his reputation 
 had escaped uninjured from what had happened. 
 This brought a soothing comfort to his heart, 
 and gradually tranquillized the vehemence of 
 his emotions.
 
 22 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 As his passion subsided reflection took its 
 place; and, it was in deep reflection that he 
 paced up and down by the lake, now gazing 
 upon its quiet depths, now looking up into 
 the expansive, measureless sky. Yes, he looked 
 upwards at last. 
 
 The man, who had escaped from the depths 
 of the ocean ; had battled with the raging 
 waves ; had wandered through the pathless 
 wilds of Africa ; had returned a beggar into 
 human society ; had found his abundant wealth 
 restored, and yet had never once looked up, 
 looked up now ; and seemed endeavouring to 
 penetrate the mysterious depths above him, 
 and to inquire out the problem of being. 
 
 What was he? Whence came he, — whither 
 was he bound ? 
 
 He was not a mere animal produce of teem- 
 ing nature, formed by her creative energies 
 out of dust, and to return to dust again. Not 
 a mere fact, — a phenomenon, — to appear for a 
 moment and to vanish for ever. No ; the 
 agonies of his soul had taught him another tale. 
 
 What was it ? — Why was it 1 — That he who 
 had so calmly contemplated the judicial death
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 23 
 
 of a fellow creature whom he thought to be 
 guilty, had been struck with such agonizing 
 horror of the deed, when he believed him to be 
 innocent. 
 
 And from whence this cruel sense of re- 
 morse, at the idea that he had, in order to 
 gratify a mere selfish passion of personal 
 revenge, pursued a fellow being, and his fellow 
 man, to destruction ? 
 
 Innocence and guilt were then very difi*erent 
 things. — To be sure they were. But purity or 
 impurity of internal motive, even when the 
 very act was the same, were infinitely difi*erent 
 things also. — Whence this 1 
 
 There was the whole theory of the moral 
 law contained in the question.^ — And whence 
 this moral law "? — How came the sense of it 
 to spring up suddenly, as it were, to life, 
 within his breast, and thus arraign him before 
 an awful tribunal, — a tribunal from which he 
 could not escape. One unseen by every eye, 
 and created in his heart. 
 
 His heart — so to seek in all these things — his 
 heart where such feelings had never been cul- 
 tivated ? — And why thus approve itself at once
 
 24 
 
 to his reason, where such things had never been 
 presented before. 
 
 He had thought little, one might almost say 
 never, about right and wrong, or these sanctions 
 and demands. He had gone along his way 
 through life, guided so far by a sort of blind 
 instinct, that he had avoided any gross ill-con- 
 duct. A kind of natural dislike to oppression, 
 cruelty, or licentiousness, had prevented him 
 from being guilty of acts of this nature, but 
 he had never asked himself why 1 
 
 He had never inquired why one thing ought 
 to be done, and another left undone. And 
 though at times he might have been led 
 to some meritorious action, by passing senti- 
 ments of justice or compassion, I question 
 whether, in the whole course of his existence, 
 since he had grown to man's estate, he had ever 
 done a thing simply because it was right. He had 
 no principle of the sort within him. He never 
 thought about what was ridit. What was agree- 
 
 O a CD 
 
 able, profitable, advisable, judicious, rational, if 
 you will, nothing more. 
 
 He walked up and down, pondering deeply 
 upon these things. Now his head bent upon
 
 TIME, THE AVEKGEE. 25 
 
 his breast — now his eje lifted up to the world 
 above, which was bj this time glittering with 
 midnight stars ; and in the breathless stillness 
 of that beautiful night, the roll of the distant 
 city, giving forth a soothing harmonj^, and the 
 only one. A sense of the infinite, like some 
 fine influence from above, began to steal, for 
 the first time, over this man's soul. A dread — 
 a hoi J dread — a sense of fearful awe began 
 to creep over him. 
 
 He had never feared anything in his life. 
 His was no coward soul — he had shown how 
 he could stand the vicissitudes of existence — 
 he had never blanched before the face of mor- 
 tal man. So it was not the timorous tremblins: 
 of the weak ; it was the awe-struck terror of 
 the strong, which began to invade his spirit. 
 Powerful himself, he was capable of a juster 
 apprehension of the resistless power which he 
 first began to apprehend. Nature was full of 
 it. On every side, this all-pervading, this 
 invincible power beset him. Gazing at the 
 vaulted sky, he dived into its awful immensity, 
 its vast extent, hemming in and overhanging, as 
 it were, all inferior nature. Turning his eyes
 
 26 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 upon the firm earth which resisted his feet, he 
 felt the stability of that rock on which this 
 earthly creation was founded. Whilst in the 
 dreadful experience of the last ten hours, he 
 read, that the God of this infinity was a living, 
 a personal, and a moral God; visiting with 
 power not to be resisted, the secret sins of 
 men ; capable of and resolute in inflicting pun- 
 ishment ; and swift to avenge wrong. 
 
 And he was filled with dread — fearful 
 dread — tremendous dread — Not so much from 
 the terror of what was personal to himself, as 
 from that sense of awe with which we regard 
 the sublime, the mighty, the irresistible. 
 
 Meditating upon such themes, he walked 
 up and down under the trees for some time. 
 
 The twilight fell, darker, and darker grew 
 the night. More stilly the silence round, and 
 more hushed the distant roar of London. 
 
 At last, behind the heavy mass of trees now 
 cast into deep shadow, a faint gleam as of the
 
 TIMlE, THE AVENGER. 27 
 
 dawn appeared, and slowly in all her beauty 
 the moon rose by degrees, and by degrees shed 
 a lustrous gleam upon the tree tops ; and then 
 in all her calm glory she began her walk amid 
 the stars, shedding that sublime and tender 
 light which human heart cannot resist. 
 
 And that it is which makes us all, poets 
 poetasters, novehsts and tale tellers, love to 
 speak of the moon. Never weary of speaking 
 of her. She cannot be vulgarized; she cannot 
 be rendered common ; she is too pure, too 
 radiant, too divinely bright and lovely. 
 
 And yet Oraiglethorpe, now in his sixty- 
 fifth year, seemed to gaze upon her for the first 
 time. 
 
 He had seen her and had made use of her 
 light. She had once or twice prevented him 
 falling into a ditch perchance ; and had served 
 to mark the day for a party in the country, 
 that she might light the jolly revellers home. 
 
 This is all she had done for him till now. 
 
 But this evening electrified, called to life, 
 awakened to a new perception, he looked upon 
 the pure silvery globe resting there in the 
 blue, measureless depths of the sky, and
 
 28 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 he felt what he had never felt before — How 
 sublime ! how fair ! how heavenly was a>ll 
 this ! And what a hymn the host of heaven 
 were singing, round this their apparent queen, 
 would man but listen. 
 
 The calm influence seemed to breathe upon 
 his agitated spirits, and to awaken the new 
 train of thought into which he now fell. 
 
 He began to think how extraordinarily 
 beautiful these things are, and to marvel at 
 his own insensibility ; that he could have 
 lived all this time, and never have once per- 
 ceived this beauty. What a poor, grovelling, 
 animal he had been. 
 
 This gentle majesty of beauty — had he 
 never once felt its influence or its power 1 
 
 Was he a perishing, insensible beast ; or had 
 he been created a man, capable of perceiv- 
 incr the excellence of all this divine order 
 
 o 
 
 and loveliness, though powerless to produce 
 
 it^ 
 
 Was it possible 1 Could it be true "i 
 
 That men went on from day to day, from 
 
 night to night, bargaining and drudging, and 
 
 amassing, and spending in revelry and jollity,
 
 29 
 
 in mere meat, and drink, and sleep, the wliole 
 remainder of their time ? — 
 
 That he could have lived daj after day, 
 and night after night, for sixty-five years, and 
 never once have understood the majesty and 
 beauty that surrounded him 1 
 
 Again he paused in thouglit and cast a look 
 backwards upon his life. 
 
 Then he gazed at the stars again. 
 
 What wondrous beauty ! — what a divine 
 tranquillity ! — What a spirit of beneficence 
 and goodness seemed to pervade the scene ! 
 
 And had he ever felt this? Had it ever 
 touched his heart "? 
 
 Never. 
 
 He had been a mere brutish stock or stone ! 
 Brutish — that was the word that seemed to fix 
 itself as the best to express his sense of his 
 own condition. 
 
 The chain of association proceeded from 
 link to link. From the state of feehng he 
 came to the state of action ; and at last, to 
 the question of questions — The appalling, soul- 
 searching question, — what, during the life of 
 sixty-five years, — what had he done ?
 
 30 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 The Being who made him was beneficent, 
 wise, and his glory and his mercy, and his 
 adorable goodness, were manifest in all his 
 works ; and above all, were to be discovered 
 in the mighty order, the grand sequence, with 
 which in the natural world causes and effects 
 follow each other in majestic succession. 
 
 He himself was a part, and though a small 
 part, in one sense, it is true, but a minute 
 atom among the infinite existences ; yet in 
 another sense, how grand ! how godlike ! how 
 infinite in perception and thought I A being 
 of mighty power for good or for evil ! — And 
 what had he done ? 
 
 Ay, that was the question of questions — 
 what had he done '? 
 
 Little enough. 
 
 When he began the retrospect of the past, 
 and really inquired what he had done — what he 
 had actually effected with the powers given to 
 him; powers the magnitude of which he could 
 not disguise to himself, he shrank, humbled 
 and disgusted, at the exiguity of the account. 
 
 That, in his present mood, the infinite insig- 
 nificance of even the most important objects he
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 31 
 
 had pursued should strike him forcibly, nobody 
 who has passed through moments like these, 
 will feel surprised. 
 
 What had he done '? To what aims had his 
 endeavours been directed 1 
 
 Wealth and power shrink into nothing 
 compared to the grand objects of the moral 
 world. The most unbounded wealth — the 
 power of a Napoleon or a Caesar — at mo- 
 ments such as these — what mere baubles 
 for children thej appear to the possessors ! 
 
 This man's aims had not even been so 
 elevated as those. The acquisition and the 
 enjoyment of personal wealth — that had been 
 all. 
 
 Had his wealth, when acquired, been 
 directed to any noble or useful purpose? 
 Had he, in the pursuit of it, ever proposed 
 to himself a single useful or noble purpose ? 
 
 Never. 
 
 To be rich and to enjoy good dinners with 
 a few cronies, — that had been the extent of 
 his ambition, the sum total of his aims. 
 
 Miserable, miserable account ! 
 
 The deficiency was like a dark gulph of
 
 32 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 emptiness yawning before him, — but tliere was 
 more behind. 
 
 Had ]ie not abused the power his wealth 
 had given him *? 
 
 To saj nothing of late events, at the recol- 
 lection of which liis soul shuddered, had he 
 never been tyrannous, oppressive, and cruel ? 
 Had he never abused the power wealth bestows 
 to exact from others what no man had a right 
 to exact from others — namely, the base subser- 
 vience of self-interest ; the timid flattery of fear ; 
 the surrender of truth and manliness, before 
 the shrine of his presumption and his 
 pride ? 
 
 His conscience gave a more satisfactory 
 answer to that question than many con- 
 sciences, I fear, could have done. He had 
 720^ abused the power of wealth much in this 
 w^ay. A few sycophants at some of his fine 
 dinners there might have been — but that was 
 all ; and these he had not called into exis- 
 tence by his demands upon flattery, — they were 
 reptiles by nature — to crawl was their element. 
 He had not crushed the noble dignity of truth 
 and self-assertion — under fears for the ultimate
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 33 
 
 interests of others but too dear, which compel so 
 many a lofty heart to a subservience detested, 
 whilst practised. 
 
 Such things are usually done among rela- 
 tions — and he had no relations and no 
 intimate connections. Selwyn he had only 
 known as a child, and Selwyn had been inde- 
 pendent of him. He had no intimate con- 
 nections. 
 
 What, none 1 
 
 Was he quite sure of that ? 
 
 And then arose, like a pale spectre, a long- 
 forgotten story — a story of many, many years 
 gone by — a story he had sworn to forget, to 
 banish from his memory as if it had never 
 been. A dismal tale bearing upon that very 
 criminality of disposition, — that stern, hard, 
 implacability of temper, — which but a few days 
 ago had nigh plunged him into such unutter- 
 able remorse and wretchedness. And never 
 once through his long life, — never until now 
 had this other instance of it awakened the 
 sense either of pity or remorse — So utterly hard 
 — iron hard — millstone hard — had he become. 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 TIME, THE AVENGER, 
 
 Now and then, may be, — the thought might 
 have intruded — but it had been driven away 
 resolutely. He had not in this instance been 
 aroused by some one terrible catastrophe — • 
 such as the one which had just passed — he 
 had not been thus startled violently from his 
 course — and therefore lie had gone on — unre- 
 lenting. Indiiferent to the fate of her — of 
 him — careless of what they might have suf- 
 fered, or of what might have become of them. 
 They had injured him — wounded him in the 
 most sensible point — his pride — and he had 
 vowed never to forget or forgive the offence. 
 He had kept his word. What had become of 
 them? Whether they had perished in their 
 destitution, or whether they still lived mise-^ 
 rably, he knew not — and till this very moment 
 had cared not. 
 
 But now . . . ! It happens to many men, 
 I believe — An action which they have looked 
 upon carelessly — guilty feelings of which they 
 have scarcely taken account, suddenly present 
 themselves, clothed in their true colours — in 
 those vivid, faithful colours, which some time 
 or other they must wear. And they are 
 
 i
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 35 
 
 astonished at their guilt, and amazed at their 
 moral wretchedness, and thej crj out, " Lord, 
 be merciful to us, or we perish !" 
 
 What gi'oan was that ? 
 
 A picture rose to Mr. Craiglethorpe's recol- 
 lection this night, — recollection vivid, as if the 
 events to which it related had occurred but 
 yesterday. Time, it appeared, might have 
 thrown his dust over and obscured it — but not 
 a line of the tale had been obliterated. 
 
 And could he '? Was it possible '? — Could 
 he have gone on eating and drinking and en- 
 joying himself — amassing sums upon sums of 
 useless gold — and never have had the heart — 
 the common kindness — the poor generosity to 
 inquire what had become of herf 
 
 What had become of her 1 
 
 It was too late to ask now. — Every trace 
 of her was lost. The happiness of reparation 
 was not allowed to him in this instance. He 
 had been cruel, implacable, and unforgiving ; 
 — in the bitterness of his soul, he had wished 
 
 D 2
 
 36 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 her to be wretclied, — hoped slie would be 
 Avretched — known she was so — and taken 
 satisfaction in it. 
 
 "With that satisfaction he mioht remain con- 
 tented. It was the onlj one this subject could 
 afford him. So many years had passed over 
 his head, that all trace of her was lost. — He 
 should never know, unless upon that awful day 
 when all secrets shall be revealed — and then 
 perhaps he might — the extremity of the evils 
 to which he had consigned one so guileless and 
 so young. 
 
 With an internal shudder he turned his 
 eyes from that picture and reverted to the 
 Wilmingtons : — To Caroline Wilmington. 
 
 Of all the groupe, it was she, — Caroline 
 Wilmington, — that had made the strongest 
 impression upon his mind. That calm, ma- 
 jestic look of ineffaceable despair, — those eyes! 
 in their awful sorrow, — that expression of 
 melancholy resignation, — of pity, such as 
 might belong to one of those angels "which 
 excel in strength/' — had raised a strange 
 emotion. 
 
 Strong himself, — this strength in suffering,
 
 TIME, THE AVEI^GER. 37 
 
 perhaps, it was, that excited such a deep 
 feeling of sympathy and admiration. He 
 trembled when he thought of Henry Wil- 
 minoton standins: there, as he had seen him, 
 at the judgment seat ; collected, firm, yet pale 
 as death, and deep melancholy darkening his 
 brow ; standing there, refusing to plead, — the 
 victim in his father's place ! Even he could 
 have wept again as he thought of Flavia, — 
 that sw^eet young creature, — expiring of grief 
 and horror on that sister's arm ; but his 
 thoughts ever returned to that sister herself, 
 that noble, noble creature, and with a strange, 
 ^vild feeling, that he neither could nor en- 
 deavoured to understand. The sense of his 
 own utter unworthiness seemed to increase as 
 this fine image rose before him. He longed, 
 yet he w^as not worthy to touch the hem of 
 her garment, — he longed, inexpressibly, once 
 to speak to her, — to hear her voice, — to tell 
 her 
 
 What would he tell her ? 
 
 He had nothing to tell. He could only 
 have told her what a heaven's angel he 
 esteemed her to be, and what a poor, miser-
 
 38 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 able caitiff lie thought himself, — was that 
 worth while '? 
 
 Or, would she stoop from her moral majesty 
 and deigu to cast a glance at him '? 
 
 To such self-abasement was this dry, caustic, 
 stern, implacable Mr. Craiglethorpe brought. 
 
 Admiration, such as j\Ir. Craiglethorpe might 
 have felt, may, in my opinion, be forgiven, to 
 an age advanced as his, by the saucy spirits, 
 entering, flushed with hope and joy, upon the 
 scene of life. It may be forgiven, if one, till 
 then ignorant of domestic happiness, before 
 life closes, had longed to put to his own lips 
 lifers sweetest cup ; and with a pure, devoted 
 admiration for excellence, have desired to call 
 that excellence his own. To bring it to his 
 fireside, to live with it, to belong to it, and 
 under its benign influences, aspire to the 
 tender, generous fervour of family affection. 
 
 How deeply did his heart now begin to 
 yearn after a reconciUation with the AYilming- 
 tons ! And more especially after Caroline. 
 He now recollected what she had been as a
 
 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 39 
 
 child — a fine, sensible child. He felt she Tras 
 the same being now that he had liked then, and 
 he longed to find a friend in her, — to go to her 
 and speak to her, and open his heart to her, 
 and to tell her how bitterly he regretted what 
 he had done, — and what a poor, miserable 
 worm he thought himself. He wanted her to 
 set her foot upon his neck ; but that whilst he 
 cast up an imploring eje at her, he might 
 read a divine compassion in hers. 
 
 He had seen a picture of the woman 
 crowned with the seven stars, setting her foot 
 upon the head of the serpent. The sweet 
 enthusiast, intent upon heavenly things, press- 
 ing forward to heavenly things, trampling 
 upon the Evil One, in the midst of her noble 
 purity. This image rose amid others in the 
 confusion of his thoughts. 
 
 How came this picture, once seen, long for- 
 gotten, to come to his recollection now 1 
 
 I fear you will be wearied with this long 
 account of what passed in the heart of an 
 ugly old man, walking up and down in 
 
 ^
 
 40 TIJIE, THE AYEXGER. 
 
 Kensington Gardens, between twelve and one 
 o'clock at night; but I will have done, and 
 tell jou what he did after he was tired of 
 w^alking about in this manner. 
 
 He wanted to go home. 
 
 He w^anted to go home and go to bed. He 
 was at last excessively fatigued w^ith this agita- 
 tion of thought, and this tumult of contending 
 ideas, and lie had been very much tired with 
 all the agonizing efforts of the preceding days. 
 Hackneyed as he was in the ways of life, he 
 still felt things with all the intensity of youth ; 
 but no one will wonder that he could not bear 
 the excitement of a continued state of violent 
 agitation without being more exhausted, than 
 some years earlier he would have been. 
 
 Therefore, he wanted to go home. 
 
 Home ! — He had no home. 
 
 Home is a place w^hich we are used to; full 
 of associations and tender reminiscences — here 
 and there and everywhere. In this corner 
 and in that, upon that chair, near that book- 
 shelf, in that closet, in that drawer. These 
 are the household gods. We do not make 
 odd little figures of them, and stick them
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 41. 
 
 about our hearths, these household gods of 
 ours, as the ancients did, but thej are there 
 all the same, and receive the same deep wor- 
 ship as of old. Some people make idols of 
 them. To make idols is ever wrong. But 
 some would almost rather die than forsake 
 them. Some can take them cheerfully up, 
 and carry them about from place to place. 
 Others think them profaned if they are moved. 
 Craiglethorpe was troubled with none of these 
 notions — he had no household gods. He 
 never had possessed any — he had been a liver 
 at furnished lodgings and hotels, and hired 
 temporary houses. There are no household 
 gods in such places. He had never wished 
 for or missed them, no more than he had 
 wished for or regretted the absence of the 
 other celestial influences. Now, he longed for 
 a hearth, and to put himself under its pro- 
 tection. 
 
 Oh! how he longed to go home and to be 
 quiet ! Oh ! how he longed for something to 
 love! Some place, even though it were not 
 his — some place where he could take shelter 
 and find comfort. He wanted it so much,
 
 42- TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 he SO wanted rest for liis spirit. He had been 
 like the restless demon of Scripture, wandering 
 in desert places — he longed to return to his 
 own home, and to find it swept and garnished. 
 
 There was no such place for him. 
 
 I told jou how discordant to the tone of 
 his present feelings were his suite of fine apart- 
 ments in Albemarle Street. All done up in 
 the most approved taste ; with plenty of gild- 
 ing, plenty of shining mirrors, crimson velvet 
 sofas and painted walls, with Cupids swinging 
 in festoons of flowers. The mirrors reflected 
 his own now disgustful figure; the gold was 
 odious to his sight; the gaudy colours, the 
 luxurious appointments were an abomination. 
 He sickened at the idea of returning to the 
 place — there was no privacy, no home for 
 him there. The only place which presented 
 itself as the least suited to his restless fancy, 
 was the miserable little den in that obscure 
 place called Pudding Lane, if I recollect right, 
 where his hour of sullen solitude had been 
 passed. Those days when he was degraded 
 by poverty in the eyes of the world, but 
 innocent of the great oflbnce. Looked down
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 43 
 
 upon by others it might, be, but loftier in his 
 own eyes than in the days of liis greatest 
 prosperity. 
 
 That place did feel something like home. 
 Its very lowliness and obscurity had a some- 
 thing sacred about it ; household gods of a 
 certain description had taken up their dwel- 
 ling there. It was peopled with the recol- 
 lection of the unbending fortitude with which 
 he had met the thoughts of the unworthy 
 treatment he had received from others — of 
 the stern pride with which he had cast every 
 old habit and association away. 
 
 Wrong or right, that period of his life was 
 not recollected without a secret satisfaction. 
 There he had been the wronged but uncom- 
 plaining sufferer. In Albemarle Street, the 
 triumphant and implacable avenger. He set 
 out to go there, — I was going to say, he 
 resolved to go there, but I believe he went 
 as one may conceive an animal goes to a 
 place where he wants to be, — without reflec- 
 tion, but by a sort of vague instinct. 
 
 It was between two and three in the 
 morning as he entered Piccadilly. The season
 
 44 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 •was at its height, and late as was the hour, 
 gaj, glittering equipages were flashing about 
 on every side. Windows were still blazing with 
 lights at houses w^here balls were being given ; 
 and through the sashes thrown up, for the 
 night had been very warm, the sound of the 
 bands, and of that noisy animating thing, 
 the cornet-a-piston, sending forth the galoppe, 
 was heard ; and the feet of the dancers, and 
 even the laughter, and the pleasant, chatting 
 voices struck upon the ear of the solitary man, 
 as he walked slowly along the flag-stones 
 beneath. 
 
 Now and then he would look up in a 
 strange melancholy way at the glare as he 
 passed it. What a vain magic lantern of 
 meaningless forms and colours does what is 
 called the great world seem to one absorbed 
 in a higher *? absorbed in thoughts and feelings 
 w^hich are that higher whilst we remain in the 
 clay 1 
 
 How lonely, how lost, how solitary did he 
 feel as he went along ! More lonely than a 
 hermit in the desert ; more solitary and cut off 
 from human communion than a monk of La
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 45 
 
 Trappe. The ^'orld had lost its interest to 
 him ; his soul was absorbed bj other things. 
 He seemed severed from it, so that it 
 appeared as if there remained not a feeling 
 in common. How utterly lost he felt ! 
 
 Oh, for a friend — some living creature to 
 whom he might go ! Amidst the strange 
 commotion within a new wish arose. He* 
 who had never sought the confidence of any 
 human being, who had never known what it 
 was to feel a wish for the relief and con- 
 solation of opening his heart, — now felt this 
 desire intensely. 
 
 The sadness not communicated pressed 
 heavy upon him. Even at his age he was 
 such a perfect child in these things that he 
 wanted help and guidance. He wanted a 
 voice to be heard above the storm within, — 
 a voice the discordant elements should obey, 
 and be reduced to peace and order. 
 
 However, he went along, and he was soon 
 out of the reach of the lively sounds and 
 scenes of the West End, and he entered the 
 quiet streets of the late busy City, — which 
 now seemed like a city of the dead.
 
 46 TIME, THE ATENGEE, 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 " The path of sorrow, and that path alone, 
 Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown; 
 No traveller ere reached that blest abode, 
 Who found not thorns and briars in his road." 
 
 COWPER. 
 
 I PEAE I am very serious — indeed, I have 
 been reproaclied with it; but I cannot help 
 it. 
 
 I never begin to meditate upon human life 
 but it will present itself to me as a deeply 
 serious thing. 
 
 Who that considers it in that light in which 
 Craiglethorpe was now first beginning to look 
 upon it, but must feel it to be deeply, deeply 
 serious 1 But I believe that those who do look
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 47 
 
 upon it in this earnest, this reallj sublime 
 light — as significant in every detail, as linked 
 inevitably with the infinite — the infinite un- 
 known of weal or woe — those who believe that 
 in this transitory dream we are laying the 
 foundation of that which we are to be for 
 ever — and ever and ever — will acknowledge 
 that life is no idle matter to trifle with, but 
 an earnest, pregnant action; and will find 
 it difficult to laugh before the awful results 
 which lie hidden behind the brief tale. 
 
 It is also my firm conviction that, looked 
 upon as a grave and pathetic tale, which rivets 
 attention and excites every sentiment of the 
 heart, it confers a really more strong and last- 
 ing pleasure than when made a mere subject 
 of sport. As Hamlet, after all, has a stronger 
 hold upon our afiections than the Merry 
 "Wives of Windsor, so they, who regard life 
 under this serious aspect, find an intensity of 
 interest in it, which far surpasses in satisfac- 
 tion all the pleasures which the gay, thought- 
 less trifler, amid his joys and amusements, can 
 conceive. 
 
 There is, it is true, a time for all things ;
 
 48 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 and laughter has its time as well as gravity ; 
 but, after all, if men will interrogate their ex- 
 perience, they will, I think, find that the 
 dearest hours of their lives have not been their 
 gayest ones. 
 
 Many, indeed, I believe, if sincere, might 
 testify how insipid an existence, spent in mere 
 hilarity, speedily becomes ; and confess the 
 yearning for a something more solid, more 
 earnest, more really exciting, than they have 
 yet found, — a something which shall call forth 
 those latent and more lofty powers, which lie 
 concealed within the hearts of most men, and 
 only require to be summoned into action. 
 
 Still, whilst I say this, I long for the power 
 to excite, in its turn, the frolic spirit of fun, 
 which so many of my great contemporaries 
 invoke, producing such delightful laughter, 
 without impairing the tender pathos of their 
 stories. 
 
 I left Mr. Oraiglethorpe passing through the 
 streets of the now silent city, with the inten- 
 tion of seeking those old lodgings, where he 
 had lived so obscurely, but in a manner which 
 better suited his present feelings. 
 
 4
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 49 
 
 I am inclined to believe if it had not 
 been for the influence of those with whom he 
 had been habituated to live — an influence so 
 prevailing with ns all — that he would, even in 
 his most prosperous hours, have preferred this 
 simple mode of life to the splendid one lie had 
 affected. There was a something so manly 
 in his taste and temper, when unsophisticated 
 bj the fashions of living wliich surrounded 
 liim, that I believe he w^as much more fitted 
 by nature to play the part of an ascetic than 
 of a luxurious man of the world. 
 
 By ascetic, I do not mean a religious ascetic 
 — the religious element in him was far too 
 feeble for such sacrifices — I mean one who 
 disregards every personal comfort in the indul- 
 gence of some prevailing passion — as glorious 
 philanthropists have done, and as miserable 
 misers have done. 
 
 The solemn bell of St. Paul's gave forth the 
 hour. 
 
 Four o'clock in the morning it was, and he 
 stood at Mrs. Dickenson's door. 
 
 He used to have a pass-key, and let himself 
 in whenever he chose to come home. This, of 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 course, had been given up. He paused a little 
 while before he would disturb the slumbering 
 household, and looked up. 
 
 The shutters were all fast closed, — the eyes 
 within the little roansion shut. Silence the 
 most profound reigned in the narrow lane. 
 The stars twinkled dimly in the small strip of 
 sky which might be seen overhead, and seemed 
 as if slumbering like the slumbering inhabitants. 
 
 I told you that he had come from Kensing- 
 ton Gardens, governed by a sort of instinctive 
 impulse, much as an animal might have done, 
 and had sought this place rather from feeling 
 than from reflection. He does not seem to 
 have calculated how late it would be when 
 he should arrive. 
 
 He stood there hesitating. He felt a repug- 
 nance against arousing the slumbering house- 
 hold ; and then first a certain shyness at 
 presenting himself in this unexpected manner 
 came over him, which told him that neither 
 was this place liome. 
 
 "What should he do ? 
 
 To return to his splendid lodgings in Albe- 
 marle Street was what he could not, and he
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 51 
 
 would not : the idea was abliorreut to Lim in 
 his present mood. But when he began to rea- 
 lize things a little, and to call his thoughts to- 
 gether, the idea of coming back to Mrs. Dick- 
 enson's began to lose its attractions. True, it 
 was a miserable, little, gloomj den, such as he 
 wanted to hide his head in ; close, and dark, 
 and dismal, with no prospect but into a small 
 square yard, shut in with high windowless 
 walls of houses. And the little chamber was 
 more like a cell than a chamber, with its low 
 ceiling, its walls not more than five or six 
 feet apart ; its one small bed, its two old 
 chairs, and other scanty furniture. 
 
 The strictly necessary alone was there, and 
 that of the humblest description. There 
 were all these advantages here to be found ; 
 for — believe it or not, as you please — these 
 privations, this denudation of everything 
 that might seem cheerful or comfortable or 
 agreeable to others, was exactly what he 
 coveted. You have heard of the gayest men 
 of fashion in that old world of sixty or seventy 
 years ago — now as far removed from the pre- 
 sent as if it were seventy ages — you have 
 
 E 2
 
 52 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 heard of dissipated men of fashion in Paris, 
 the most brilliant at that time of cities, who, 
 after liaving figured at Versailles, that gayest 
 of courts — ^^ after having adorned the very 
 highest circles of that splendid life, have been 
 suddenly struck down by some unseen blow — 
 whether of love, or fortune, or crime, who 
 knows ? And they have cast all this at once 
 from them — loathing it — recoiling from it — 
 flying from it : and where ? Not to their 
 country-seats — not to seek consolation amid 
 the scenes of sweet tranquillizing nature — but 
 taking refuge, as in the only place congenial 
 to their darkened spirits, amid the gloomy 
 privations of La Trappe. There was no La 
 Trappe for Craiglethorpe, or I believe he would 
 have gone there. Perhaps this illustration will 
 make you understand the nature of his present 
 feelings. 
 
 The miserable lodging would have suited 
 him then exactly ; but, as he stood at the door, 
 unwilling to awaken the echoes at that still 
 hour, by raising the knocker, other thoughts 
 presented themselves. 
 
 Mrs. Dickenson was a busy, chattering, good-
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 53 
 
 liumonred sort of woman, — a prodigious gossip, 
 — and never tired of bothering her lodgers with 
 her conversation, when she could get an excuse 
 for it. 
 
 In his former mood — that mood of pride 
 driven inwards, as I maj saj — which had led 
 him to such a place to live in as Mrs. Dicken- 
 son's, the good woman's vulgar familiarity had 
 troubled him little. To be in such company 
 was part of that voluntary humiliation of cir- 
 cumstances with which he indulged the bitter- 
 ness of his spirit. 
 
 Occupied with his own thoughts and feelings, 
 dissatisfied and angry with others, but secretly 
 extremely well pleased with himself, he had 
 endured good Mrs, Dickenson's torrent of 
 words with little discomfort or irritation. He 
 used to get away and shut his door in her face, 
 as she came prattling up the stairs behind him, 
 and think no more of her than of a troublesome 
 insect, to be got rid of. 
 
 But in the strange agitation of his present 
 thoughts, he no sooner recollected this, no 
 sooner represented her to himself as opening 
 the door, with loud exclamations and a torrent
 
 54 TIME, THE AYEXGEE. 
 
 of questions, than his incUnation for the good 
 woman's dingj cabin of a lodging, which had 
 been lately so prevailing, left him at once, and 
 he resolved at all events not to go there. 
 
 What would he do ? 
 
 Wander among the streets all night. But 
 he might be interrupted by the watch ; get 
 noticed, perhaps exposed. His name had 
 been already in the newspapers. How detes- 
 table by any accident of this kind to excite 
 public notice again. 
 
 Should he go to that gloomy church-yard 
 hard by, with its heaps upon heaps of moul- 
 dering graves, — its grim tomb-stones, and 
 smoke-blackened trees ; and there go and lie 
 down with his face upon a grave-stone, and 
 like some dreary gowl or spectre take refuge 
 with the dead *? 
 
 Oh no! That was as hateful to the spirit 
 of life, yet in spite of all, most strong and warm 
 within him, as was the gaiety of the west end 
 to the deep gravity of his soul. 
 
 Life has a strange antipathy to death. 
 
 The stronger the life within us, the more 
 powerfully are they opposed. Like two ant a-
 
 TDIE, THE AVENGEE. 55 
 
 gonistic forces Id nature, it seems as if one 
 would not endure where the other was. 
 
 He recollected sundry little obscure taverns 
 in the neighbourhood. One of them might 
 chance not jet to be shut up. He would 
 try his chance. 
 
 He left Mrs. Dickenson's door never to return 
 there, and wandered among the narrow lanes 
 and streets again. 
 
 In the corner of one, where two very dark 
 close alleys met, he saw lights still burning. 
 He approached. The door was yet unfastened 
 and he went in. 
 
 The host, an old man, not jolly and ruddy 
 as mine host should be, but a little gray- 
 visaged being, bent with age, was putting up 
 his shutters and preparing to close for the 
 night, when the unexpected guest entered and 
 asked whether he could have a lodging for the 
 night, and in a room to himself 
 
 Mine host eyed him suspiciously. 
 
 '* This is a late hour to be going about, and 
 you are a stranger to me," said he. 
 
 " Well, I suppose it is your calling to enter- 
 tain strangers.''
 
 56 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 " AYlij, jes, at proper hours ; but it's odd 
 for a man of jour age to be going about 
 seeking a lodging at four o'clock in the 
 morning — jet jou don't look like a vagabond, 
 neither/' 
 
 " No, I am not — and jet I am a yagabond," 
 T\-as the replj; for a vague recollection of 
 Cain, a vagabond upon the earth, came over 
 the mind of the saddened man. "But I am 
 wearj of having been out walking all daj, 
 and I would fain rest in a bed, however humble, 
 and in a chamber however small. Let me have 
 one, and I will paj jou well." 
 
 "I dare saj jou will," said the tavern- 
 keeper to himself. " And," thought he, " if 
 there's a thing I do hate it's one of those 
 gentrj. A regular beggar, naj, a reputed 
 thief, one knows at least where one is ; but, 
 these respectablj dressed personages, with 
 plentj of monej in their pockets, looking 
 about in holes and corners, — one never under- 
 stands what's at the bottom of it, — and be- 
 sides, I've no bowels for men with pockets full 
 of gold." 
 
 " Whj do JOU hesitate ? Wlij don't jou
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 57 
 
 answer me V Craiglethorpe began again, some- 
 what irritablj. " If joii cannot take me in, 
 or if jou will not take me in, say so at once. 
 It will be daylight before you have settled, if 
 you are such a time about it ; and then there 
 will be plenty of j)laces open for me." 
 
 Nobody likes to be reminded of that. That 
 what they will not do, hundreds of others will 
 be found ready to do. The old man had 
 besides a good many more rooms at his dis- 
 posal than people of his calling usually have, 
 and he was not sorry they should be occupied. 
 But he was not a common-place fellow, though 
 of so humble, not to say equivocal a calling, and 
 so mean an appearance. He was a character 
 in his way, and one of his characteristics was, 
 that he had a strong moral taste or sense of 
 his own. 
 
 As fas as regarded excessively poor and very 
 wretched creatures, he was not, as it would 
 appear, extremely nice as to the characters of 
 his guests ; but if there was a thing he detested, 
 it was flourishing crime. The swindler, the 
 gambler, the cheat, the usurer, in handsome 
 clothing and with purses full of gold, he hated.
 
 58 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 He had taken Oraiglethorpe for an aged gen- 
 tleman of one of these descriptions ; and if 
 there was that thin^: which could a^rain double 
 his abhorrence of yice, it was when united with 
 the hoary head. Yet there was something in 
 the tone of Oraiglethorpe's voice after all, 
 which to his experienced ear began to create 
 doubts as to the justice of his first suspicions. 
 So after eyeing him a little, he relented and 
 said, he should have a room to himself and a 
 good bed. 
 
 " I don't want a good bed," said the strange 
 guest.
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 59 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 " Ste smiles, appearing, as in trutli she is, 
 Heaven-born, and destined to the skies again." 
 
 COWPER. 
 
 "I DO not want a good bed," said Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe. 
 
 The host looked np at his customer, with a 
 grim smile, and replied : 
 
 " Well, then, sir, we must try to find jou a 
 bad one. But humble as this place looks 
 upon the outside, we have good beds to let, I 
 assure you; that is, when my wife — my Bessy 
 up there," making a sign with his shoulder 
 towards the ceiling, "chooses to let a body 
 have the use of them. Indifferent beds one
 
 60 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 may find anywhere; but we Avill try to suit 
 you." 
 
 " The thing I want most — the only thing 
 I want most," said Oraiglethorpe, some- 
 what impatiently, " is quiet — Silence and 
 quiet." 
 
 The old man took the hint, and said no 
 more, but lighting a small brass candlestick at 
 the lamp, which blazed against the wall, opened 
 the inner door, and marshalled the new comer 
 into a long, low, narrow passage, which, in the 
 obscurity, appeared of almost interminable 
 length. 
 
 There was no appearance of windows on 
 either side. Now and then were doors to the 
 right or left, but all these doors were closed, 
 and the most perfect silence pervaded the 
 place. The old man, almost bent double with 
 age, walking slowly, and with great apparent 
 diinculty, went first, — Oraiglethorpe followed. 
 Little observant was he, and little heeding, in 
 his present humour, and it was well he had 
 fallen into good and honest hands, for the 
 place he was in was so utterly obscure and 
 out of the way, that any secret crime might
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 61 
 
 have been perpetrated, and would almost cer- 
 tainly have escaped detection. 
 
 The passage made many sharp turnings at 
 right angles before it terminated, as it did at 
 last, in a lofty door of fine mahogany, which 
 had once been of the handsomest description, 
 but was now worm-eaten and degraded by 
 dirt and age; as were also the brass lock and 
 handle, of imposing appearance from their size 
 and the elaborate workmanship which adorned 
 them. 
 
 The old man took out a large key, applied 
 it to the lock, and opening the door, the two 
 entered what appeared, by the feeble light of 
 the candle, to be a large and lofty hall. 
 
 The roof was so high that it was quite in- 
 visible by this faint illumination ; but massive 
 pillars and pilasters might be dimly seen, and 
 the remains of old gilding and coloured fresco- 
 painting, that was fast fading or falling in 
 pieces from the walls upon the pavement of 
 black and white marble. As the old man 
 proceeded, he from time to time held up the 
 candle without speaking, and threw its gleams 
 upon these vestiges of ancient magnificence,
 
 62 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 now all fallen into decay ; and as he did so, 
 through the dim obscurity, the fine arches 
 which supported the once splendid ceiling, 
 mi^ht from time to time be observable, as 
 they passed along. 
 
 Having crossed the hall, they approached 
 the foot of a grand flight of mahogany stairs, 
 which descended from a gallery above. On 
 each side of the low, shallow steps, which were 
 extremely wide and handsome, rose massive 
 balustrades of richly-carved mahogany, equally 
 telling the tale of ancient magnificence and 
 splendour passed away, for they were covered 
 with dust, and hung with cobwebs. Still pre- 
 serving silence, these stairs mine host began 
 to ascend, followed by Craiglethorpe, who felt 
 a not unpleasing sense of mystery stealing over 
 him, as he passed through this ancient man- 
 sion ; the profound, unbroken silence and the 
 air which pervaded it, leading to the conclusion 
 that it had been long utterly deserted. 
 
 At the top of the stairs they entered a cor- 
 ridor, defended by a balustrade of the same 
 massive description as that of the stairs, and 
 which ran along two sides of the hall, midway
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 6'3 
 
 between floor and roof. Still without speak- 
 ing, the old man first lifted up, then lowered 
 down his candle, and showed the hall with its 
 arches and pillars below, and then lifting up 
 the light, displayed the magnificent roof — 
 
 " Self-poised and carved into ten thousand cells, 
 Where light and shade repose." 
 
 Rich with gilding, and a sort of mosaic 
 work of splendid colours, looking like some 
 fine piece of jewellery work, which it evidently 
 had been intended to imitate. Then he turned 
 round, and with his dim, red eye, withered 
 face and spare figure, looking in this strange 
 scene, like some wizard or enchanter, cast a 
 significant look at his guest. 
 
 But Craiglethorpe made no remark. He was 
 in that mood in which no earthly object appears 
 splendid, — no earthly story of decay interests : 
 he had been, in thought, upon the confines of 
 that higher world, — that world of substantial 
 realities, in comparison of which the sub- 
 stances which belong to matter and time, 
 appear but as vain shadows. Besides, the 
 profound quiet which reigned around them
 
 64 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 affected liiin very much; though not usually 
 very sensitive to external impressions, he felt 
 like one charmed to silence. I doubt whether 
 lie could have spoken had he been so inclined, 
 but he was not so inclined. 
 
 At the end of the corridor was another 
 door, with lofty richly ornamented architrave, 
 the lofty door itself being of fine mahogany, 
 the panels had been once most richly gilded, 
 but the gilding was now black with age. Again 
 a key was applied to a lock, the door opened 
 and they entered a wide gallery, the ceiling 
 of which, like that of the hall, was rich with 
 gilding, and with the scarlet and blue and 
 purple which were painted on small compart- 
 ments, like some painted glass-window of an 
 old church. The floor of inlaid wood was 
 darkened, and oyerlaid with dust. Into this 
 gallery the doors of numerous apartments 
 opened on each side at considerable intervals, 
 each door being of the same lofty height . The 
 same rich materials, were panelled and adorned 
 with gold, and each had a magnificent archi- 
 trave above. 
 
 One of these doors, about the middle of the
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 65 
 
 gallery, the old man opened, and displayed 
 a large and lofty apartment, proportioned 
 to the magnificence of the hall. It looked 
 gloomy, for it was hung with tapestry, all the 
 bright colours of which had long ago faded, 
 nothing remaining but the deep greens and 
 browns, approaching to black, which indeed 
 always pervaded it, for it had been woven, it 
 would seem, in imitation of some of the 
 darkest landscapes of the old masters. A 
 dark green four-post bed, with a lofty canopy, 
 round which still drooped plumes of dusty 
 feathers, stood in a recess at one end of the 
 the room. There were four windows, lofty 
 and narrow, from which depended green velvet 
 curtains, now tattered and all in decay. These 
 were opposite the door ; and opposite the foot 
 of the bed was a fire-place, in which were 
 still the remains of a fire, which, though it 
 was summer time, seemed to have been lighted 
 not very long ago. 
 
 And now at last the wayward-looking old 
 man, who appeared so well in character with 
 this strange scene, at last broke silence, and 
 addressing Craiglethorpe, said, — 
 
 " I brought you here because I thought I 
 
 VOL. I. J1
 
 66 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 saw jou were not a person to herd with them, 
 down there — with my guests. Bessj has the 
 letting of this house in rooms or floors, as 
 seems her best. It's not often anybody comes 
 as she likes to put here, but slie keeps up a 
 fire in one or other rooms, and sheets the beds 
 for such as now and then come. This bed is 
 aired and sheeted ; it has been slept in not 
 very long since. I thought, maj be, it would 
 be what you wanted, — will you have anything 
 for supper, sirl" 
 
 " No. You are right, — this will do for 
 to-night ; I shall have the room to myself, 
 I conclude.'' 
 
 " Ay, sir, not only the room, but the house. 
 Nobody sleeps here but a choice customer 
 now and then. Bessy will not let ordinary 
 guests come in ; but she has it her own way. 
 The letting of the rooms is hers, not mine. 
 But the place stands in such a strange, out of 
 the way neighbourhood, and not too respect- 
 able neither, that few care to come here, — 
 such as she, at least, thinks good enough. 
 Anything else, sir, to-night V 
 
 " No, — leave me the candle, — and good 
 night." 
 
 i
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 67 
 
 So the two men parted. The old man lighting 
 a small bit of candle, which had been left in a 
 tin candlestick, in one corner of the fire-place, 
 and taking his departure, wished his guest 
 good night ; shutting the door in a stealthy 
 manner after him, as if he feared to awaken 
 the echoes in this caye of silence. 
 
 Mr. Oraigiethorpe was by this time very, 
 Tery weary, — stupidly weary. A manner of 
 being weary usual with him, and which, per- 
 haps, was one cause why he had been able to 
 go through so many difficulties and dangers 
 as he had done with so little injury to his 
 constitution. The man, whose powers seem 
 to retire within himself after any great exer- 
 tion, to slumber, as it were, while the external 
 man is dull, stupid, and only semi-animate, 
 husbands them much better than he who is 
 all irritating and sleepless excitement in this 
 state of weakness. 
 
 He was in too dull a mood to be much 
 moved, or his attention much excited by the 
 scene through which he had just passed, and 
 yet insensible as he was, he could not help 
 making some reflections, upon the yicissitudes 
 
 F 2
 
 GS TIME, THE AYEXGER. 
 
 of tilings, and especially upon what liad 
 brought this mansion, once the almost royal 
 abode of some princely merchant, to this utter 
 desolation and decay. He knew well there 
 were many instances of houses such as this 
 standing forgotten and neglected amid the 
 intricate alleys and deserted courts of the vast 
 city, but I believe no one can be brought into 
 one without feeling a certain sadness. 
 
 It may be merely that wealth has migrated 
 to other quarters, and the house forsaken 
 because its masters have become richer and 
 richer, and have at last desired to take part 
 in that modern west end life of the world, 
 which seems the fond aspiration of such. But 
 the scene may tell another tale, — of ruin and 
 desolation, of sorrow and despair, and, to the 
 imaginatiye, it almost infallibly raises asso- 
 ciations of this description. 
 
 So it did with Craiglethorpe in his present 
 humour. 
 
 Tired as he was, he did not seek his bed 
 immediately; he sat down in a huge arm- 
 chair, lined with green A^elvet, which stood by 
 the side of it, and he looked up at its
 
 TIME, THE AA^ENGER. 69 
 
 mouldering curtains, its lofty tester, sur- 
 mounted with the broken plumes of dusty 
 feathers, and then he fell a musing. 
 
 He thought upon those who had gone 
 before, — upon the generations passed away. 
 How the tide of time, unceasingly strong, 
 swept them, one after another, into the grave, 
 into that fathomless gulph wherein all mortal 
 things must go ; of those who had lived and 
 enjoyed ; and whose voices had rung merrily 
 in these silent places, and who were all now 
 gone. — Where? Ay, that was the question, 
 — that question for ever recurring, — where ? 
 
 And then, as with a sort of solemn pity, 
 he thought upon those who had lived here, 
 and whose footsteps might be discovered amid 
 the mamificence in ruins which surrounded > 
 him, — and reflected upon the numbers whom, 
 even in his short course, he had seen swept 
 away to oblivion by commercial disasters, — 
 he began to ask himself whether the history 
 of the inhabitants of this place might not be 
 a dreary tale of the same sort. 
 
 Again, the reminiscence of an old story, — 
 so pertinaciously driven from his mind that
 
 70 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 lie had long succeeded in almost entirely for- 
 getting it, — in feeling as if it had never been, 
 — rose to his mind with that preternatural 
 vividness with which it had visited him under 
 the trees in Kensington Gardens. 
 
 There was a tale of complete destruction 
 connected with that story. A noble, ancient, 
 respectable city house, utterly ruined, and 
 shattered to atoms ; a splendid mansion, in 
 some remote corner of the city, which every- 
 body had heard of and nobody knew much 
 about, shut up and deserted. 
 
 The connexion of thought was painful. 
 
 He shook it off, and, undressing, lay down 
 in the bed, closed his eyes, and slept. His 
 dreams were a troubled repetition of the agi- 
 tating thoughts of the day. 
 
 First he was in the court of the Old Bailey, 
 now darkened with that heavy gloom which 
 seems to pervade most objects in our dreams. 
 There he sat, rivetted, as it were, chained 
 to his seat as by some invisible charm, his 
 tongue clinging to the roof of his mouth, 
 vainly, agonizingly endeavouring to speak. 
 There was the judge, in his solemn scarlet
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEK. 71 
 
 robes, the counsel round the table, the jurymen 
 in their box, with their intent, earnest looks ; 
 the excited crowd, listening with heads anx- 
 iously bent forwards, and horror written in 
 their countenances — and there was the pri- 
 soner, with that pale, serious face, that 
 steady, calm, gentle, but resolved eye of his, 
 that modest yet firm figure and gesture. In- 
 nocence in self-sacrifice — and he knew it, and 
 he could not speak ; for his tongue was frozen, 
 as if by the hand of death. 
 
 Then close by him passed that tall and 
 noble creature, clasping the dying innocent in 
 her arms. That sweet, beautiful, fragile girl 
 — and as she passed him, what a look did 
 those grand, dark, solemn eyes give! 
 
 The look his fancy had dimly pictured, and 
 which he now saw — and he turned away and 
 then began to weep, — and when he raised his 
 head again, all that scene had passed in the 
 hurried confusion of a dream, and he sat by the 
 side of a pure stream of deep river water, which 
 glided slowly, slowly by, and upon which two 
 milk-white swans were, with their arched 
 necks and ruffling- wings of down, slowly and
 
 72 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 majesticallj^ gliding. Magnificent ^^illows bent 
 their aged stems, and their light tendrils 
 dipped swaying and swaying up and down 
 with soft soothing motion into the water, and 
 all around were ancient groves of magnificent 
 trees. Planes stretching wide their huge 
 shading arms ; spiral cedars rising in massive 
 pyramids to the sky. Oaks, like heavy columns, 
 supporting their vast canopy of boughs — the 
 soft grass-plat, in a gentle descent to the river, 
 by which he sat musing. 
 
 And then ! oh vivid, as if the past was no 
 longer the past ! as if the law of nature — the 
 dreadful law, was reversed — and the days of 
 youth, the irrevocably lost, could come again ! 
 
 — he felt a soft hand that hand — 
 
 oh that hand! — he shivered in his dream, — 
 come stealing, stealing, and off wdth his hat — 
 and away she flies with a shriek of wild, 
 girlish laughter ; — and over the grass like a 
 wild fawn, and is lost amidst the merging 
 greens in a moment. 
 
 And his heart beats as it beat then — and 
 up he starts, and would run ; but he feels again 
 as he felt years and years ago, — that it is in-
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 73 
 
 consistent with his dignity to run; and he 
 checks himself, and calls, rather in a harsh, 
 irritated voice — oh! how that harsh voice 
 grated against his ear now — "Lilla! — Lilla, 1 
 saj! — Bring it back again !" 
 
 And then out starts the light figure from 
 behind the green branches, mocking, mocking ; 
 and that provoking, sweet, gaj, naughtj, tri- 
 umphant face is before him, wild with sport and 
 wicked enjoyment of his vexation; and the 
 lovely hand and arm wave the hat before him, 
 and then hold it forth, as if tempting him to 
 come and take it; and as he, forcing himself 
 to a dignified slowness, comes walking up, one 
 part provoked, and ninety-nine parts enchanted 
 — just as he thinks he has caught the culprit 
 and rescued his hat — out bursts a sliout of 
 laughter, and, pointing at his hair, now all 
 blown about round a face that could not very 
 well become such disorder, away she flies 
 again, and the provoking chase is renewed. 
 
 A chase that becomes more and more pro- 
 voking, every time the same scene is by the 
 wild sweet young one repeated, — till at last, 
 as, alas ! he used in old time to do, he grows
 
 74 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 reallj angrj, cross, and out of humour — 
 speaks in an authoritative tone of command — 
 and the quarrel ends bj the lovely perverse 
 one flinging the hat in a pet at his feet, and 
 walking sulkily towards the house. 
 
 The agitation, the intense agitation of feel- 
 ing which succeeded the renewal of a scene 
 passed away, years, and years, and years 
 ago, — even from his memory, — it is difficult to 
 describe. 
 
 He awoke, trembling and panting, — not to 
 sleep again, not to dream, but to lie in a sort 
 of passion of recollection, of delight, of regret, 
 of remorse, of grief, of horror, of self-abhor- 
 rence. Now he could see — for this dream had 
 revived the long series of that past history — 
 now he could see what, in his sternness, and 
 his pride, and his sourness, and his ill-temper, 
 he never would see then. 
 
 Ah ! why are we so blinded to our faults, 
 till the irrevocable hour is past! 
 
 Now he could see how dreadfully he had 
 mistaken himself, her; their circumstances, 
 their relations, their feelings, their tempers; 
 their mutual duties, and their mutual faults.
 
 TIME, THE AVEN'GER. 75 
 
 Faults ! Were hers to be called faults ? 
 Did thej eyen approach to faults, those little 
 mistakes and errors which he had visited as 
 heavy crimes 1 
 
 Faults ! Was his implacable, unforgiving 
 pride only a /az^/z^f His pitiless satisfaction! 
 His miserable satisfaction of revenge at a re- 
 tribution which, it is true, he had not called 
 down, but which he had enjoyed ! 
 
 Oh ! as that gay sparkler, that lovely trifler 
 of days long, long, for ever, ever gone by, was 
 restored to him in that dream — as there lying 
 awake, he recollected, with a vividness that 
 only belongs to that state of the body and 
 mind, scenes upon scenes of his life, in which 
 that lovely, wild, young, careless thing had 
 borne a part — as he contrasted his own vile, 
 morose humour with her playful sweetness, his 
 strong, bitter, cruel feelings of mingled love 
 and pride, and her charming inditference and 
 good-natured insensibility — he could have 
 groaned aloud at the remembrance, — the re- 
 gretful remembrance of how entirely, in the 
 harshness of his proud, exacting temper, he
 
 76 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 had mistaken the way to a heart, which might 
 perhaps, after all, have been won. 
 
 And at the thought, he writhed with pain. 
 And then rose a fury — a fury like that in 
 Clarence's dream, wdth face like an angel, and 
 bright hair .... 
 
 With smiles like the sun-beams. That 
 sweet, gay countenance; that lively, careless, 
 easy air; that perfection of grace in gesture and 
 in form ; sallies brilliant as her own, eyes bright 
 as her own, fascinations like her own .... 
 
 And then Mr. Oraiglethorpe — it was a life 
 since these things had happened — then, when 
 that visage rose and presented itself, then Mr. 
 Oraiglethorpe started from his bed, and could 
 not, would not, attempt to rest more.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEH. 77 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 " Gone are all the charms which made thee 
 
 To thy children so divine ; 
 
 Could these walls but weep and wail thee, 
 
 They would add their tears to mine." 
 
 The Cid. 
 
 He felt ashamed of liis weakness, as lie 
 went to the windo^Y, opened the curtains, and 
 looked out. 
 
 The sun had risen ; and as the morning 
 light falls upon us, we seem to awaken from 
 the visions of the fancy, to be restored to 
 reality, and prepared to begin a new life. 
 
 He looked out. 
 
 It was so early that not a creature was 
 stirring, the cold clear light of the early dawn, 
 not as yet obscured by the smoke, fell upon
 
 78 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 the little court below, and the outlines of the 
 houses were sharj^lj given against the cloudless 
 blue of the skj. 
 
 A few dustj sparrows, chirping about, gave 
 the onlj sign of life. 
 
 The front of the house looked upon this 
 close, little court, which was surrounded by 
 tall, old, ruinous houses. As Craiglethorpe 
 opened the window and looked out, he could 
 form some idea of its external grandeur. 
 The fine stone steps, the elaborate architrave 
 of the entrance door, the stone-work which 
 surrounded the windows, and adorned the 
 corners of the building, the stone vases on the 
 cornice, all were in a style of ancient and 
 venerable magnificence. 
 
 " It has been a grand old place," he thought, 
 " and how quiet and silent it is now." 
 
 Then he leaned out upon the window sill, 
 that strange old man, and fell again to his 
 musing. Things were still strangely mingled 
 together in his thoughts, things present and 
 past. The present feeling connected with the 
 Wilmingtons, and the lively retrospection sum- 
 moned up by his charm — with the reflections
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 79 
 
 of the evening before, upon man — upon God 
 — upon the true issue of things. But the 
 impressions were less lively and the ideas 
 somewhat confused, for his spirit was weary 
 with the struggles he had gone through, and a 
 reaction had taken place. 
 
 A dull, stupid, unsatisfactory feeling it was 
 to which he now yielded himself, with that 
 power of passive endurance which he pos- 
 sessed in so eminent a degree. 
 
 I do not know how long he remained there, 
 leaning against the window, and his eyes 
 resting in an abstracted manner upon the 
 scene before him. Presently, the hum and 
 stir of life began to arise indistinctly, and in 
 so hushed and still a manner, that it excited 
 his attention. He then remembered it was 
 Sunday morning. 
 
 He was aroused at last by a knock at his 
 door. It was his host. 
 
 " Come in,^' said Oraiglethorpe, without 
 turning round ; and the old man entered. 
 
 " I beg pardon for intruding, sir, — I hope 
 you have rested well ; though it be a strange, 
 old-fashioned sort of a bed.''
 
 80 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " Yes, — I did -well enongh. The place 
 seems quiet." 
 
 " A J, it is, sir. The lower rooms are let 
 to a great paper manufacturer as a warehouse, 
 — and his carts only come from time to time 
 to bring paper, from his mills in the country, 
 to be stowed awaj here, or to fetch bales for 
 the printers. Usually, it's as quiet on a week 
 day as it is to-day. And the house stands 
 back, sir, yer see, and most of the houses 
 there, round the court, as let as warehouses, 
 too ; and their doors being the other way, 
 one hears little or nothing of what is going 
 on.'' 
 
 " I shall sleep here again to-night,'' was 
 Craiglethorpe's answer to this little account. 
 ' Certainly, sir ; if you like it." 
 " Any one else upon this floor V 
 "Not a soul, sir; the furniture in this 
 room chanced not to be sold when the rest 
 was all cleared away. I forget the reason 
 why ; so my wife, who is very fond of the 
 old place, and has got the charge of it, kept 
 it as it was ; and it has served as a lodging 
 for some houseless heads of the better sort.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 8l 
 
 in its time. There are such — who hare to 
 brave rough weather in this life, and are glad 
 of a shelter a little out of the common 
 thoroughfare, as one may say, sir." 
 
 And he eyed his guest as he said this 
 with a mixed expression of compassion and 
 curiosity. 
 
 " No doubt,'' said Oraiglethorpe, with a 
 certain gesture of impatience, "I like the 
 quiet, and shall come and sleep here again 
 to-night, do you hear V 
 
 " Yes, sir, and in the meantime, will you 
 please to take breakfast here rather than in the 
 common room, for we can hardly dignify it 
 with the name of coffee-room," said the old 
 man ; who at times would express himself in a 
 manner rather at variance with his external 
 appearance. 
 
 '' Yes — no. I don't want breakfast," thought 
 Craiglethorpe ; "what have I to do with eating 
 and drinking V Then disliking singularity^ 
 and roused by the old man's inquiring looks, he 
 added ; " Yes, bring it up here." 
 
 " What would your worship please tc 
 havel" 
 
 VOL. 1.
 
 82 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " I don't know ! Can't jou let me be quiet 
 with jour confounded botheration 1 Anything, 
 and leave me to myself, will you T 
 
 This sudden outburst startled the old man, 
 but confirmed him in the opinion he entertained 
 of the importance of his singular guest. So 
 making his reverence, he stole quietly away, 
 and did not return till he came bringing up a 
 tray with a neat little breakfast of tea, rolls, 
 and eggs, very daintily set out, to which Craigle- 
 thorpe, in an absent manner sat down. 
 
 As soon as the old man had again left the 
 room, he swallowed a cup of tea, and then 
 taking his hat from the chair on which he had 
 flung it the previous night, opened the door 
 and entered the gallery. The sun had risen 
 pretty high by this time, and its beams shone 
 through the window at the end of the gallery, 
 and displayed all the rich ornaments of the 
 ceiling and panelling to perfection. 
 
 These were very ancient in their fashion, but 
 did not appear so blackened with age, or so 
 dilapidated as they had done the preceding 
 night ; it was rather the accumulated dust of 
 many years, and the tarnishing of a very long
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 83 
 
 neglect, which obscured their lustre. Two or 
 three family-pictures still hung up and down 
 against the walls ; the rest were all perfectly 
 bare of what could in any way be called furni- 
 ture. 
 
 Craiglethorpe scarcely glanced at these 
 things, and indeed might be said not to notice 
 them at all, as he made his way to the window 
 that orerhung the hall. But insensible as he 
 was in his present mood, to external objects, 
 he could not help being struck by the extreme 
 magnificence of this hall. 
 
 The loftiness and fine symmetry of the pil- 
 lars which, supporting the noble arches, sprang 
 to the lofty roof; the centre of which was, as I 
 have said, self-poised, flat, and most richly 
 adorned with carved work and gilding, pro- 
 duced upon his mind the full efi«ect which noble 
 architecture, in its fine proportions, seldom 
 fails to excite in the least critical eye. The 
 most uninstructed taste in these things yields, 
 as it were, spontaneously to the sublimity of 
 the efi'ect. And thus Craiglethorpe felt, as 
 he stood looking over the dark balustrade of 
 heavy carved and gilded work, into this splen- 
 
 g2
 
 84 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 did hall. The bright rajs of the sun streamed 
 through stained windows, and threw gleams of 
 rich-coloured light upon the floor and across 
 the pillars. 
 
 There it stood, in its solemn silence and 
 solitude, stripped of everj vestige of furniture 
 or human in-dwelling. Lifting its lofty arches 
 on high, utterly lonely and forsaken ; whilst 
 the chambers below, the rich mahogany and 
 gilded doors of which were by the full light 
 of day discernible, were now, as he knew, 
 empty, except of the wares of a man of trade, 
 whose large bales of paper occupied what had 
 once been the abode of so much splendour and 
 pomp. 
 
 Craiglethorpe was not a man much given to 
 indulge in imaginative thought. He did not 
 stand there speculating and building romances 
 as to the fate of those who might have lived 
 there before. Yet it was with a feeling of 
 increased gravity and sadness, — a yet stronger 
 sense of the vanity and emptiness of human 
 things, that he slowly descended the wide 
 stairs with their richly scrolled balustrades so 
 quaintly adorning them, and walking slow and 
 
 I
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 85 
 
 pensive across the hall, which faiutlj re-echoed 
 to his quiet footsteps, approached the lofty 
 door with intent to let himself out. 
 
 He could not bear the idea of going through 
 the passage and the low entertaining rooms of 
 the tavern, exposed to the gaze of whomsoever 
 might chance to be there. 
 
 To his satisfaction he found the huge rusted 
 key sticking in the large elaborate lock of this 
 door, in itself quite a fine piece of workman- 
 ship ; he turned it, then tried the handle of 
 the door, and letting himself into the street, 
 closed it after him. 
 
 He had no particular purpose to answer in 
 going out. In the present depressed state of 
 his spirits, and pre-occupation of his thoughts, 
 he had not planned where to go. From that 
 natural impatience of rest which possesses 
 most men, go out he must, but the feeling was 
 merely instinctive. He felt particularly dreary ; 
 he had never known what it was to feel so 
 dreary before ; he had never felt the utter 
 loneliness of being press upon him so before. 
 In the hours of disappointed hope and blighted 
 affection, of which he had had his share, this
 
 86 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 feeling of utter loneliness had never depressed 
 him ; the excitement of his angry passions 
 had kept him company, as it were ; the fierce 
 agitations of the storm had occupied and filled 
 his mind. Now there was a dead stillness and 
 calm, but it was the calmness of torpor rather 
 than peace. 
 
 Without religious hope, without reference 
 to the sublime, the beautiful, the tender, the 
 good all pervading in the all surrounding — 
 power. Without a sense, and a strong sense, 
 of the personal existence and actuality of this 
 subl'me and tender presence, there may be 
 calm, but there is no peace to the heart of 
 man. He may be lulled into a species of 
 tranquillity, — ^it may be repose ; but there is no 
 peace. — Peace is a sense of ineffable comfort 
 and rest. — Not to be described, — not to be 
 appreciated, except by those who have ex- 
 perienced it. Feeling such as that which must 
 have been brooding over Milton's spirit, when 
 he wrote those lines which I will venture to 
 introduce here, as pervaded with the sense of 
 what I mean.
 
 TIME, THE AYEKGEK. 87 
 
 " But peaceful was the night, 
 When the Prince of light, 
 His reign of Peace upon the earth began ; 
 The winds in wonder wist, 
 Smoothly the waters hist, 
 Whisp'ring new joys to the mild ocean, 
 Who now hath quite forgot to rave, 
 Whilst birds of calm sit brooding o'er the wave." 
 
 It was the joy of that peace which was so 
 utterly wanting to the wearied spirit of the 
 forsaken man. The sweetness of that inner 
 calm which the Prince of Peace brought down 
 from heaven to visit the heart of tempest-tossed 
 humanity. 
 
 Oh, how arid! how desert, how dreary, 
 how torpid ! how destitute is the hush of the 
 passions without it. 
 
 " Ye are the salt of the earth, but if the 
 salt of the earth hath lost its savour, where- 
 with shall it be salted 1 It is thenceforth good 
 for nothing but to be cast out, and to be trodden 
 under foot of men." 
 
 This truth maj be applied to other states of 
 the mind than to those here signified. Most 
 certain it seems to be, that the very attain- 
 ment of what should be the Christian temper?
 
 88 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 its meekness, its gentleness, its submission ; its 
 contempt of worldly excitements, of distinction, 
 of wealtli, of consideration; if not united to 
 that strong faith, and those fervent aspirations 
 which more than supply to the soul the want 
 of the baser incitements to action, becomes 
 but a poor, mean, w^orthless thing, only fit to 
 be cast out and trodden, as it eventually will 
 be, under the foot of men. 
 
 And the same may be said of those who 
 having outlived the power of the passions, 
 passed through the delusions of the world, 
 and finding they are delusions, have at last 
 attained the temperance and calm of more 
 rational views — yet see no purpose beyond — 
 and are alive to no mightier and higher 
 influences. — How inexpressible is the barren- 
 ness of the desert which remains ! 
 
 He went walking, thus desolate, along the 
 streets, yesterday so crowded with the bustle 
 of commerce, and resounding with the dis- 
 cordant cries and sounds of busy life ; now 
 still, and almost deserted, resting in the calm 
 of the sabbath. 
 
 The shops all shut. No noise of carts and
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 89 
 
 wains struggling along tlic croNvded waj. No 
 ceaseless stream of busj-faced men and women, 
 pouring toward this side and that — the street 
 vacant, except when the carriage of some one 
 going to church, shot lightly bj ; and a few 
 well-dressed men and women, from time to 
 time, were met upon the causeway ; from which 
 not business and hurry alone, but wretched- 
 ness, penury, and rags, seemed banished upon 
 the blessed day. 
 
 The merry bells were now ringing from the 
 innumerable steeples of the city, and as Orai- 
 glethorpe went along, the charity children 
 came thronging by — and upon the steps of the 
 churches, as he passed, the people were seen 
 crowding in. And the sun shone bright and 
 beautifully upon the scene ; — and it looked all 
 so right and so happy. 
 
 He had, perhaps, never been in the city on 
 a Sunday before in his life. At least never 
 walking its streets at this church-going hour. 
 A sort of wistful feeling began to creep over 
 him, as he saw all these men and women look- 
 ing so clean, so decent, so respectable, throng- 
 ing in through the wide opened doors of God's
 
 90 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 house ; and heard the cheerful bells drop into 
 that single-voiced call, which seems to speak a 
 summons. 
 
 He almost longed to stop and go in. But 
 he did not go in. He went on — his head 
 bent down upon his breast — musing and 
 drearj. 
 
 At last he entered St. Paul's Churchyard ; 
 and the mighty cathedral, in all its splendour, 
 rose before him ; the dome looming against 
 the deep blue sky. The bright sun casting 
 the whole edifice into the strongest relief of 
 light and shade. It was grand, it was glo- 
 rious. He lifted up his head and gazed ; — 
 bent it down again, and went on — but he 
 stopped once more, just where the iron gate 
 opens to the street, near what was then Pellatt 
 and Green's shop, I believe. People were 
 going up the steps — he suddenly crossed the 
 street, and followed. 
 
 The organ was pouring forth one magnifi- 
 cent peal of sound, which rolled down the 
 lofty arches — rose to the vaulted roof, and 
 seemed to swell throughout the whole building. 
 Like the very elements in their magnificence —
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 91 
 
 a very storm of sound. Yet not a troubled, 
 angry storm — but as the sublime voice of a 
 mighty wind. 
 
 The lofty dome rose high above him, and 
 an inexplicable sensation of solemnity and 
 grandeur seemed to elevate him, as he bared 
 his head, lifted up his eye to the vast cope 
 above, and felt every nerve thrill with the 
 grand solemnity of the organ-peal. 
 
 Service had begun. The choir was already 
 nearly full, but one of the vergers took him to 
 a place in an obscure corner, where, unseen by 
 all, he took part in the solemn gravity of our 
 cathedral service. 
 
 There was a prayer-book and an anthem- 
 book in the place where he sat. Mechanically 
 he opened the prayer-book, and followed rather 
 than joined in the service. 
 
 " We have done the things we ought not to 
 have done, and we have left undone the 
 things we ought to have done — but thou, 
 Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders. 
 Spare thou them which confess their faults. 
 Restore thou those who are penitent "
 
 92 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 And a cry from liis inner heart seemed to 
 rise and go up with the words. 
 
 Then the organ pealed forth again, and the 
 joyous hymn burst forth as if the angels who 
 excel in strength were shouting in glad 
 chorus : — 
 
 " come let us sing unto the Lord — let us 
 heartily rejoice in the strength of his salva- 
 tion " 
 
 Ringing gladly, thankfully, joyously, the 
 hymn was pealed forth around him. 
 
 He felt a strange quivering within. 
 
 Then the Psalms were chanted solemnly and 
 tranquilly. 
 
 " Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place 
 from all generations ; before the mountains 
 were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed 
 the earth and the world ; even from everlast- 
 ing to everlasting thou art God " 
 
 There was one sweet little child sinojinor 
 among the white-robed choristers ; he might 
 have been from six to seven years old ; his 
 little head was covered with clustering curls 
 of fair hair, his blue eyes filled with a look 
 of sentiment, most innocent, yet almost
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 93 
 
 divine. His little moutli rolling forth sounds 
 of surpassing beauty, his little soul all wrapt 
 in the ecstacj of the sound. 
 
 Craiglethorpe watched this little creature 
 and thought upon the cherubim ; indeed, his 
 mind was fast filling with ideas, collected it 
 might be at odd times ; remnants of the very 
 imperfectly religious teachings of his childhood, 
 all crowding fast upon his imagination toge- 
 ther, whilst his heart — it was enough — began 
 to swell and glow, was elevated and expanded. 
 
 Whether thus prepared he was able to join in 
 the prayers, earnestly, sincerely, devoutly, and 
 for the very first time of his life to cry — ay, and 
 from the inmost recesses of his soul — for God's 
 mercy upon him, a sinner, I do not pretend to 
 say. All that I know is, that when the 
 service was over he felt comforted and 
 strengthened; the bitter wounds of his spirit 
 soothed and healed, and he found courage to 
 address the Wilmingtons, with a most sincere 
 and earnest desire to seek their forgiveness 
 and to obtain it. 
 
 As for that other dark hidden chapter of
 
 94 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 his life, it was like some deeply shrouded cave, 
 the brighter the sun might shine without, only 
 the more sensible, the more intense were the 
 depths of the obscurity within.
 
 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 95 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 " It was not the wounds and gashes — 
 Not the pain that caus'd their woe, 
 'Twas the shame the foul dishonour." 
 
 The Cid. 
 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe to Henry Wilmington. 
 
 "You, no doubt, think yourself a much 
 injured man — I don't deny it. I can only 
 say, that when I first began this business, I 
 thought you deserved anything. If you have 
 suffered through me, I have suffered through 
 you. I believe you can comprehend the pos- 
 sibility of a man in my position, suffering 
 more than a man in yours. However this 
 may be, I have only to say that if you have 
 the magnanimity to meet me, it would be a 
 pleasure to me to shake hands with you. ^ I
 
 96 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 am not a man of many words nor given to 
 sentiment, but there are occasions in life that 
 would awaken feeling in a stone/' 
 
 The reply to this brought these two men, 
 standing in such an extraordinary relation to 
 each other, together. 
 
 Henry was at that time staying with his 
 wife and sister at a quiet little family hotel in 
 the New Road, to which he had removed from 
 Newgate. Mr. Wilmington was dead, and 
 they were only waiting till the funeral had 
 been solemnized in order to return to Wales. 
 
 It was a little quiet room which they occu- 
 pied, looking upon the small shady garden 
 which separated them from the New Road, 
 and the trees in which, being lofty poplars, 
 effectually screened the little drawing-room 
 they occupied from the eyes of the passers-by. 
 
 The party had removed here in the dusk 
 of the evening, being naturally very anxious 
 to escape observation ; for Henry had become, 
 most unwillingly, the hero of one of those tales 
 which peculiarly excite the appetite of vulgar 
 curiosity.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 97 
 
 Vulgar curiosity ! I check myself for calling 
 it so. It is a natural, and not a vulgar curi- 
 osity, that desire of beholding the face of those 
 who have played an heroic part. The vulgar 
 only mistake in the means they often employ 
 for the gratification of this desire, by not suffi- 
 ciently attending to the feelings of its object. 
 The three were, naturally, as I said, most 
 anxious not to be made the gazing-stocks of a 
 crowd. Indeed, now the excitement of tho 
 last ten days was at an end, and all the appal- 
 ling horror, the racking anxiety, had subsided 
 into a feeling of perfect security, they each one 
 felt the effect of the sudden reaction upon their 
 nerves. 
 
 Henry was grave and meditative. More 
 gentle and tender than ever in his manner to 
 his wife and sister, but the cloud of melan- 
 choly which had darkened his brow, had not 
 yet entirely dispersed. How should it ? Both 
 he and Caroline, though all anxiety had ceased, 
 and a new catastrophe was impossible, could 
 not recollect what had passed without feelings 
 of great pain. 
 
 The very escape of Henry was founded upon 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 a circumstance which he could never reflect 
 upon without anguish. It is true, he had from 
 the first believed that his father was the real 
 culprit ; but there was something in the posi- 
 tive confirmation of his suspicions which gave 
 him so great a shock, that it was some time 
 before he could feel anything which approached 
 to rejoicing at his own escape. 
 
 Things had, however, been so managed, that 
 the infamy of the charge had not been openly 
 carried home to Mr. Wilmington. A few 
 vague hints and rumours in the newspapers; a 
 sort of whispered suspicion of who was the 
 real offender, had got about ; but that was all. 
 
 The death of the miserable man was so far 
 opportune. Death absolves. He was gone. 
 He could no longer defend himself, and common 
 humanity forbade to spurn at or revile him. 
 
 Caroline, like Henry, was grave and serious, 
 though quite composed ; but the reaction had 
 made Flavia positively ill. 
 
 The change from the most agonizing suffer- 
 ing the heart was capable of enduring, to 
 almost unmingled joy, was too powerful for 
 her. Her agony had been the most intense,
 
 TIME, THE ave:n'gek. 99 
 
 because her warm, loying, ardent temper had 
 not been schooled to suffering bj previous 
 trials, as had been those of the others ; besides, 
 the force of the reaction was diminished to 
 them, by their sorrow upon their father's 
 account. So far, it was positively of use. The 
 dear little creature was now lying upon a sofa 
 beside the window, looking extremely pale and 
 delicate. She was indeed so feeble, that she 
 could scarcely walk across the room. She had 
 her eyes fixed upon her husband, following 
 him as he walked silently up and down the 
 chamber. It seemed as if she could not satisfy 
 the thirst for gazing, or bear to lose sight of 
 him for a moment — him, whom she had 
 thought so soon to behold no more, now re- 
 stored to her as from the grave. 
 
 She could only gaze and feel ; she could 
 not think. The trembling of her joy was 
 almost like the tremulous vibrations of great 
 fear. It had indeed been with considerable 
 difficulty that she had withstood the mighty 
 flood of joy — unmixed joy such as hers, though 
 the assurance of Henry's safety had been com- 
 municated with every possible precaution. 
 
 H2
 
 100 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Caroline sat by the window near the sofa of 
 her sister, looking out into the garden and 
 watching as it were the never-ceasing stream 
 of people who were passing behind the trees ; 
 but her thoughts were far awaj. They were 
 dwelling upon the death-bed of her father — 
 that weak and wretched sinner. They were 
 asking those deep, those awful questions, which 
 the departure of a poor, imperfect, guilty crea- 
 ture calls up in the yearning mind. 
 
 When the excellent depart, the thoughts 
 repose in faith. The dark curtain has dropped 
 — the impenetrable mystery lies undiscover- 
 able behind ; but every instinct of our nature 
 seconds every conclusion of our reason, and 
 declares that mystery to be the mystery of an 
 unimaginable felicity. 
 
 Not so in such a case as this. 
 
 How painfully the anxious heart ruminates 
 and asks, and searches into the limits of that 
 mercy of which there is such dreadful need. 
 Will it 1 Can it extend so far as to include 
 the unhappy one who is gone '? 
 
 With what solicitude does the memory re- 
 trace every little extenuating circumstance of
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 101 
 
 a life mis-spent ? Every little trait of goodness 
 exhibited, weighing temptations and disad- 
 vantages against mistakes and errors, — longing 
 to pray for mercy upon the departed one gone 
 to his final account. Prayer for the dead 
 seems so natural to the human heart. 
 
 No wonder neither Henry nor Caroline 
 were overcome by the sudden rush of joy 
 which had almost overwhelmed Flavia. There 
 were abundance of drawbacks to mitigate the 
 force of the current as far as they were 
 concerned. 
 
 Caroline's thoughts were occupied in these 
 meditations, — these searchings, these anxious 
 questionings of the spirit. Henry's were en- 
 gaged upon the same subject, but in a different 
 way. He was rather thinking, with a pious 
 and tender pity, upon the painful departure, 
 — upon the circumstances under which the 
 father he had never ceased to love, had died. 
 Thus they were severally engaged in that 
 little room when the postman's rap was heard, 
 and Mr. Craiglethorpe's letter was brought up. 
 
 Henry did not recognize the hand, and 
 opened it with an air of indifference ; he was
 
 102 TIME, THE AYEXGER. 
 
 thinking of other things ; but as he read it he 
 smiled gently, then read it again, and put it 
 into Flavians hand. But no sooner did Flavia 
 see the name at the bottom of the page, than 
 she threw the letter from her, with an ex- 
 pression of horror, as if it were impossible to 
 read a word of it. 
 
 Henry smiled again, — a fond smile it was 
 now — at this little act of passion, and stooping 
 down, and picking up the note, he said, 
 
 " Will you not even read a word in his 
 handwriting, Flavia V 
 
 " Oh ! how can you ask me '? How can 
 you, for one single moment, think that I 
 either would or could 1 What has he to do 
 with us? And what business has he to 
 intrude upon you, — to write to you, — to 
 poison our happiness with thoughts of him V 
 
 Henry gave a little laugh, called her " child," 
 and gently patted her cheek. She threw up 
 those loving eyes at him, and gave him such a 
 look, — such a look of intense affection. 
 
 One such look would have repaid him 
 almost for years of sorrow. Oh, the ineffable 
 treasures of a true, loving heart !
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 103 
 
 " Will you read it, then, Caroline ? as this 
 naughty little, unforgiving thing won't," said 
 Henry, handing the letter to Caroline. " It is 
 rather a curious production. The man is so 
 unused to bend that he does not know very 
 well how to set about it ; but there is some- 
 thing touching to me in the sentence at the 
 end." 
 
 " I think he suffers," said Caroline, return- 
 ing the letter, after haying read it. " I think 
 he has experienced the truth of what he says. 
 His situation must have been horrible. Will 
 you see him, Henry'?" 
 
 •' See him ! — See him !" almost screamed 
 riavia. " See him ! — What can he mean 1 — 
 What should we see him for ? See him ! — 
 Good heavens, Caroline, could you bear the 
 thoughts of it?" 
 
 " Perhaps not, my love, — but Henry might ; 
 Henry has to forgive him, you know." 
 
 " Henry may — but we never can." 
 
 " In one sense, my love, we cannot : one 
 cannot forgive the pain inflicted upon others. 
 You cannot forgive Henry's sufferings. Luckily,
 
 104 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 my dear girl, it is not required of us. It is 
 not 0U7' business to do that ; but we can 
 forgive our own share, and that we will try 
 to do, won't we *? This proud, irascible man 
 humbles himself to confess what he has suf- 
 fered. I don't think we can find in our hearts 
 not to forgive him." 
 
 Flavia shook her head. 
 
 Then she said, — 
 
 " What does he want Henry to do V 
 
 " Only to meet him, and shake hands with 
 him." 
 
 " That's not asking forgiveness." 
 
 " Among men I believe the request amounts 
 to that." 
 
 " And will Henry 1" looking up at her 
 husband. 
 
 " Yes, my love," said he, stopping and 
 returning to the sofa, for he had resumed his 
 walk up and down the room : — " Yes, my 
 darling, Henry will." 
 
 She was silent a moment, then she only 
 said, — 
 
 " It is like you, — it is right. — You are better 
 than I am ?"
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 105 
 
 He stooped down and kissed her. — Oh, how 
 he did love this loving joung creature ! 
 
 Henry to Mr, Craigletliorpe, 
 
 " C Family Hotel, New Road. 
 
 " It is so particularly disagreeable to me to 
 go out, and to risk being recognized in the 
 streets, that I hope jou will excuse my asking 
 you to come to me, instead of my coming to 
 you ; a thing I would certainly otherwise have 
 done. I believe we shall both be the more 
 easy for shaking hands ; and I can honestly say, 
 I shall do it with pleasure." 
 
 Mr. Oraiglethorpe liked the tone of this 
 note very much. There was nothing he liked 
 so well as brevity and simplicity ; and to have 
 his overtures for a reconciliation received in 
 this manner, was just what was most comfort- 
 able to his feelings. 
 
 He had the greatest aversion to a scene. A 
 thing in which he felt himself most peculiarly 
 ill calculated to play a part ; and nothing but
 
 106 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 the strong emotions, the agonizing sense of 
 regret for his conduct, which he had felt, could 
 have led him to the step he had taken. 
 
 He did not feel any awkwardness at the idea 
 of meeting Henry after the receipt of this 
 letter. As far as he himself was concerned, 
 he knew well the simple, straightforward man- 
 ner in which he should set about, and get 
 through a business, many would have found so 
 difficult and so delicate ; his only misgiving 
 had been as to how things would be received 
 on Henry's side. 
 
 He was now satisfied, and wrote to say, that 
 he would call upon Henry that very evening, 
 between eight and nine o'clock. 
 
 Composed as he now was, and firm as he 
 was, he nevertheless felt a sort of dislike to 
 the idea of this meeting taking place by day- 
 light. There is something in shade so con- 
 genial to all strong feelings. 
 
 At the time he had appointed, the thin spare 
 figure of Mr. Craigiethorpe might be seen
 
 TIME, THE AYEI^GEE. 107 
 
 slowly passing up the streets which led from 
 his remote lodging to the City Road. This he 
 entered, and mingling with the western-bound 
 stream of passers-by, was borne forwards to 
 the place of his destination. 
 
 It was a dark night, and not a star to be 
 seen, and the air was cold and ungenial. The 
 lamps glimmered and shed their pale light 
 upon the pavement as he walked forwards in a 
 slow, lingering sort of manner, like one who 
 is far from being in a haste to arrive at his 
 journey's end. 
 
 He did not think much as he went along ; 
 he had made up his mind to obtain this satis- 
 faction, and he followed the course into which 
 this determination had led him without further 
 reflection. Yet every now and then, as hap- 
 pens when we are about to do something 
 rather out of the common way, following 
 some strong impulse from within — contradic- 
 tory thoughts would flash into his mind, and 
 questions such as " What am I here for ? — 
 What am I about 1 — What's the use V and 
 so on, arise. 
 
 Then he would stop. Perhaps turn half-
 
 108 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 way round. Once, indeed, he absolutely re- 
 traced his steps a few paces. But the impulse 
 which urged him forward obtained the mas- 
 tery. He arrived at the small iron gate which 
 opened into the garden in front of the hotel ; 
 and pulled the bell, for the gate at that hour 
 of the evening was locked. 
 
 A maid servant appeared with a candle, 
 shading it from the night air, and inquired his 
 errand. 
 
 " I am come to see Mr. Henry Wilmington. 
 Do you happen to know whether I am ex- 
 pected r 
 
 " Yes, sir. I suppose so, for he dined rather 
 earlier than usual to-day, and would have all 
 the wine and things cleared off as if he 
 expected company.'^ 
 
 " Is he alone V 
 
 " Yes, sir, except the ladies.'' 
 
 " Are the ladies, as you call them, in the 
 room with him now '?" 
 
 " Were not, sir, when I cleared away the 
 things. The ladies were in the drawing-room 
 in front, and Mr. Henry Wilmington was 
 walking up and down the dining-room at the 
 back."
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 109 
 
 " Take me into that back room, then." 
 Henrj Wilmington had in the midst of the 
 distressing circumstances which surrounded 
 him, as he stood at the bar of the Criminal Court, 
 been startled, affected, touched to the very 
 soul, by the sudden start forward, — the recog- 
 nition of his innocence, so passionately made, 
 and by the subsequently abrupt departure of 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe. 
 
 He was of so kind and forgiving a temper, 
 that less than this would have led him to 
 meet and be reconciled to the man who had 
 placed him in so cruel a situation ; but this 
 circumstance had greatly moved him, and the 
 more he reflected upon it, the greater was its 
 effect. This sudden burst of feeling in one 
 he had considered so utterly without feeling ; 
 this passionate recognition of his own mis- 
 taken severity ; this cry of anguish, not to be 
 mistaken, which had burst from him when 
 convinced of the wrong he was committing, 
 were not to be forgotten by a man like Henry. 
 The whole dark scene was of that nature 
 which a man, once having gone through, never 
 forgets, which casts its shadow over the whole
 
 110 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 of the future life, and alters its hues and its 
 character to the end. But in the midst of 
 that thick darkness, this incident had beem 
 like a flash of light suddenly illuminating the 
 gloom of the hour, and the impression it had 
 left was ineffacable. 
 
 It was therefore with considerable emotion 
 that Wilmington awaited the interview with 
 this singular man, of whom he had, moreover, 
 a distinct remembrance in former days. 
 
 Mr. Oraiglethorpe was not one to be easily 
 forgotten, though fifteen years had elapsed 
 since he had been a frequenter of his father's 
 house and table. 
 
 Henry's feelings were in great measure 
 shared by Caroline, who took her usual ex- 
 panded view of this as of other things ; but 
 Flavia was quite refractory. Nothing could 
 soften Mr. Oraigle thorp e's conduct in her eyes. 
 The hard-heartedness, the implacable resent- 
 ment, shown in his conduct, appeared to her 
 too wicked and too cruel, to afford the 
 slightest shadow of palliation or room for 
 indulgence. 
 
 She had suffered too horribly, poor thing,
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. Ill 
 
 and, like most of us, she was apt to measure 
 the atrocity of the crime bj the extent of the 
 misery it had occasioned, rather than by the 
 turpitude of the motives from which it might 
 have sprung. 
 
 It seemed impossible for her to realize the 
 idea that Mr. Oraiglethorpe ever could have 
 believed in Henry's guilt ; and that burst of 
 passion which touched and affected the two 
 others so much, appeared to her only the ac- 
 knowledgment, when too late, of a foregone 
 error. 
 
 Henry tried in his quiet way to argue the 
 matter with her, but how could he be dis- 
 pleased with this ardently affectionate heart. 
 It was her passionate esteem, amounting to 
 almost idolatry for his good qualities, which 
 rendered her so sweetly unreasonable. He 
 was obliged to content himself with begging 
 her to go with Caroline into the drawing- 
 room, and let him meet Mr. Oraiglethorpe 
 alone. 
 
 The door opened, and the heart-stricken 
 man entered. 
 
 The character of his appearance was much 
 changed.
 
 112 TIME, THE AVENGRR. 
 
 Anguish of mind, remorse, unwonted visiter, 
 Avliose summons to the bar of conscience had 
 been so long delayed, but which, now aroused, 
 began, as fabled of the never-sleeping furies, 
 to shake the scorpion whip. Remorse 1 — a 
 late repentance ! — retrospection ! — the fearful 
 review of his past life ! — the sense, for the 
 first time, of the dread reality of those things 
 on which he had never thought before — all 
 these had done their work. 
 
 But this self-humiliation could not alto- 
 gether degrade — could not destroy that innate 
 dignity which in every circumstance attends a 
 character, so firm, so resolute, so perfectly 
 truthful and simple as was this. But they 
 had broken him. The closely-knit frame 
 which, like some firmly built edifice, had 
 seemed formed to defy the injuries alike of 
 storm and time, was a ruin. — A ruin of what 
 had once appeared so invincible in its strength 
 — broken and falling fast to decay, but even 
 thus inspiring a certain reverence. 
 
 He was evidently much afi'ected. 
 
 His letter had been brief and rough. It 
 was his usual style of writing. In this case
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 113 
 
 almost more so, perhaps, than was usual, because 
 he scorned all exaggeration, and abhorred the 
 least approach to sentiment. 
 
 He ran into the opposite extreme. Could 
 he liave done so, he \YOuld even now have effaced 
 from his countenance that expression of deep 
 emotion which was visible as he entered the 
 room ; but that he could not do. Though little 
 accustomed to think of the efiPect he was 
 producing, he would fain have stilled the 
 tremor which was shaking every nerve ; but 
 he could not. 
 
 The door opened, and he came in. 
 
 Henry stopped in his walk up and down the 
 room as Mr. Craiglethorpe approached, and 
 turning to him that face so full of kindness and 
 cordiality — an aspect ever shining so warmly to 
 the hearts of his friends — approached him and 
 held out his hand. 
 
 The other took it — pressed it — but did not 
 speak. 
 
 He felt choking. Unwonted emotions- 
 were heaving at his chest; and a something 
 strange was about his eye. 
 
 He waited a moment whilst Henry looked 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 upon liiin with a gentle kindness, which he 
 seemed to feel, rather than to see ; and which 
 melted that which was freezing about his 
 heart. 
 
 He looked up and said, — 
 
 "Hemy, I cannot feel at ease till I tell 
 you — that I ask your pardon from the bottom 
 of my heart for the wrong I did you." 
 
 " Pardon,'' said Henry, gently, " is not the 
 word. You thought yourself in the right, and 
 you were justified in thinking yourself in the 
 right. I thank you, and we have all reason 
 to thank you, for feeling sympathy with the 
 sorrow that was occasioned. I am very glad 
 of this meeting." 
 
 " Henry, I did not much fancy you as a 
 lad. There was something too gentle and 
 good boy about you to suit my rude taste. 
 It is not the only mistake I have made in my 
 Hfe." 
 
 " I was not a boy to be very popular with 
 anybody, I beheve," said Henry, with one of 
 his gentle smiles. 
 
 " I have learned lately to estimate qualities 
 by a different standard from the one I used in
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 115 
 
 those years," said Oraiglethorpe. "It miglit 
 have been better for me if I had learned the 
 lesson earlier ; but it's no matter/' And he 
 checked a sigh. 
 
 " Never too late to renew old friendship, 
 sir,'' said Henrj, cheerfully. 
 
 " Can jou saj this to me? Old friendships! 
 A sorry old friendship it has proved to you, 
 Henry.'^ 
 
 " I cannot forget what it had been to my 
 poor father, sir ; and I hope I never shall." 
 
 " And yet it is easy enough to forget such 
 things. Most people find it very easy — most 
 people find it hard to remember their own 
 little matters of this sort — if of this sort you 
 choose to call it — nobody troubles themselves 
 with their progenitors' obligations." 
 
 " I loved my father," said Henry ; " He had 
 his faults, but he had been an afibctionate 
 father to me." 
 
 " He's dead. Let us say nothing of him." 
 
 No ; he could not extend to the father 
 the feelings excited by the son. The old 
 implacable nature would crop out, — as they 
 say of a hidden spring. His present sufierings 
 
 I 2
 
 11 G TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 — the wrong he had so nearly done — the 
 horror he had so narrowly escaped, — his 
 mortifications — his disappointments — his self- 
 humiliations — his rights — all had arisen from 
 this source. 
 
 The very process which was going forward 
 in his mind seemed to increase the contempt 
 and disgust with which he thought of Wil- 
 mington's conduct. It could not be expected 
 that he, a child as yet in these things, should 
 be able to attain the sublime height of indul- 
 gence for faults he would have abhorred him- 
 self for committing. That last finishing of the 
 moral edifice — that last touch which gives to 
 humanity the features of the angel — no, he 
 could not — it could not be expected that he 
 should attain to that. 
 
 That stretch was for Henry — not for him. 
 
 There was a little stop after this. Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe then began again. He hesitated 
 a very little. Had he ever done so in his life 
 before '? I know not ; certainly not for many 
 and many a long year. 
 
 "Is your sister here? I should like to 
 see Caroline — and your young wife — she is 
 weU r 
 
 I
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 117 
 
 " Yes, pretty well. Do joii really wish to 
 see Caroline 1 She is in the next room — I 
 will call her." 
 
 " Better take me to her — And your wife, 
 Harry — I saw your wife once," he continued, 
 with some appearance of effort, and a slight 
 flush passing over his sallow cheek, " I should 
 like to feel that they had both forgiven the 
 past. They are sweet creatures." 
 
 *'I will slip in and see whether they are 
 there." 
 
 " Now, my sweetest Flavia,you will oblige me. 
 .... Recollect how great were the vexations — 
 how severe the disappointment — how heavy the 
 apparent wrong. Be just, my darling — We shall 
 all be better and happier after we are recon- 
 ciled and every thing forgiven. Unforgiveness 
 is a cruel weight upon the heart. Meet him, 
 my love, with cordiality — For my sake, Flavia." 
 
 She turned up her eyes to him, so full of 
 what she was feeling, and said whisperingly ; — 
 " Ah ! but it is for your sake."
 
 118 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " But he has asked it — he is waiting there, 
 mj dear — He has felt all this yerj much — His 
 was a cruel situation as well as ours. Be just, 
 mj own love." 
 
 " Ah !*' shaking her head ; " I must be a 
 great deal more than that. . . . But T will 
 try to dissemble/' 
 
 "Nay, do it from your heart, Flavia, it will 
 be of no use else. Do it from your heart. 
 God has restored us to each other. Do not 
 withhold this only sacrifice of thanksgiving 
 which you have to offer, my love.'' 
 
 She smiled, gave him her hand, and he knew 
 she was won. He might venture to introduce 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe. Caroline was understood 
 before. 
 
 He returned to the dining-room. 
 
 Craiglethorpe stood with his back to the 
 door. He seemed examining a print over the 
 chimney-piece. It was a water-colour drawing 
 of a head and half length. The style was 
 antiquated, but not without a certain merit. 
 A beautiful face of a Hebe very ill drawn, for 
 it was an old thing. I remember it well. The 
 lovely shoulder — it was less than a half length —
 
 TIME, THE AYEI^GEE. 119 
 
 was all out of perspective ; but the face, with 
 its beaming eyes and sweet radiant smile was 
 beautiful ; and the curls fell in profusion round 
 the neck and shoulders; a blue ribbon being 
 passed through them round the head. It was 
 a charming face. 
 
 He was bending towards the frame, and en- 
 deavouring, as it would seem, to read the name 
 of the artist who had done the original. 
 
 " Hebe" was the only word inscribed beneath 
 the draNving. 
 
 He seemed so much absorbed with this exa- 
 mination, that he did not turn round when 
 Henry entered the room ; but as he approached 
 he sighed slightly, and turned away from the 
 chimney-piece. 
 
 " Will you come into the next room V said 
 Henry. " My wife and sister are there.'' 
 
 The thoughts of the absorbed man seemed for 
 the moment to be far away. He seemed to have 
 forgotten the request he had made. He 
 glanced up again at the print — then he appeared 
 to recollect himself, and shaking his head 
 slightly, as if to disperse some recollections 
 that oppressed him, said : —
 
 120 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " Thej are very kind. Thank you ; I shall 
 like it much." 
 
 Flavia was sitting in an easy chair as they 
 entered. She was still very weak. She had 
 on a white sort of invalid gown, trimmed with 
 fine muslin, and her beautiful light-brown hair 
 fell with its profusion of curls somewhat dis- 
 hevelled, round her neck and shoulders. There 
 chanced to be a blue ribbon passed through it. 
 Henry used to love that colour, it harmonized 
 so well with her eyes. 
 
 So dressed, and with her head advanced a 
 little forward in a sort of expecting gaze as the 
 door opened, she did not look very much 
 unlike the water-colour drawing of the Hebe in 
 the other room. 
 
 The moment Oraiglethorpe's eye glanced 
 upon her, as if struck with some sudden 
 recollection, he started and stepped a few 
 steps hastily forward, with a strange, agitated 
 expression of face. Then, recollecting himself 
 as suddenly, the transient passion passed 
 away, and, turning to Henry, he said : —
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 121 
 
 " Will jou tell your wife that I wished to 
 see her, to say to her, that I am very sorry 
 for what she has suffered. Will she give me 
 her hand upon it V' 
 
 Flayia rose upon this^ — but though she 
 strove to disguise it, the effort with which she 
 got up from her chair showed how dreadfully 
 her frame had been shattered. 
 
 He could not help observing this. — He 
 looked shocked, and said very seriously: 
 
 '' Your sufferings have, I fear, been very 
 gi'eat indeed." 
 
 " They are over now," she replied, gently. 
 
 She could no more than the rest of the 
 world resist the strange fascination exercised 
 by Oraiglethorpe. The strange interest he was 
 sure to excite. 
 
 Her feelings were as gentle as her tones. 
 She was vanquished. All was forgiven as he 
 spoke. 
 
 " You are a very kind young creature, I see 
 that," was his reply. 
 
 And then he turned to Caroline, who was 
 standing a little nearer the window. 
 
 " And Caroline," he said, approaching her ;
 
 122 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " Caroline ! — You used to plaj with me in 
 old times, Caroline, — when jou were a little 
 brown gipsy of a girl. We were all fond of 
 JOU- You will not be harder than jour 
 brother/' 
 
 " No," said she, " I have felt for jour share 
 in this business most trulj, I assure jou, Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe.'' 
 
 " Have JOU V said he, wistfullj, and with 
 a strange tenderness of tone ; " Could heart 
 be so generous !" 
 
 Enough of this. 
 
 I do not know how jou think, — but I think 
 that never man got through the business of 
 asking forgiveness from those he had so 
 cruellj tortured, and jet could hardlj be 
 said to have wronged, in a more simple and 
 unaffected manner. 
 
 Henrj and Caroline had been accustomed 
 to think so much of Mr. Craiglethorpe — to 
 look upon him for such a length of time as 
 an injured man; and to compassionate his 
 fate with the peculiar compassion felt for 
 those who, returning, after long exile, to their 
 native land, have perished in the ocean —
 
 TBIE, THE AVENGER. 123 
 
 Thej had so manj recollections of what he 
 had been to them as children, that they were 
 prepared almost to love him. And thej met 
 his advances with a feeling amounting to 
 something like affection. [They felt happy 
 when, these little explanations being oyer, 
 he sat down among them, and entered into 
 conversation. 
 
 He was serious and thoughtful, and some- 
 what melancholy. His caustic, sarcastic, 
 epigrammatic style of conversation, which they 
 recollected so well of old, was no longer there. 
 But he spoke well. What he did say bore 
 the impress of his uncommon sense and 
 ability. They talked of countries where he 
 had been. He described those mysterious 
 regions of Central Africa which he had tra- 
 versed in his weary pilgrimage to his own 
 country. And, as Flavia heard of those 
 tracts of virgin soil, yet, as it were, untrodden 
 by the foot of man, — of that teeming animal 
 life which covered those fertile plains, and 
 where the great destroyer had not yet been, 
 — of the swarming antelopes, the wild asses, 
 that by myriads dwelt there, and sought their
 
 124 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 food from God, — of the fierce beasts of prej, 
 created, as it were, to keep do^Yn tliis swarm- 
 ing animal life, below the level of the 
 vegetable, and supply a speedy, almost pain- 
 less means of death to those which, unless so 
 kept down, must have perished by the slow 
 agony of famine. — As he told of those flowers, 
 beautiful as the roses of Eden, dyeing these 
 swelling plains with the tints of the western 
 sky ; of those lofty trees, the growth of ages, 
 standing in fine groups unmarked upon the 
 plain ; of those precipices, rising up in 
 bold diversity among the woods — where the 
 lion made his den and the leopardess her 
 lair — as he told of these things, in a manner 
 peculiarly his own, she listened, and was 
 beguiled into a most unexpected liking. 
 Most women have a good deal of the Des- 
 demona in them. The evening wore away ; 
 and still these four remained seated com- 
 fortably round the table. 
 
 They parted at last, and agreed soon to 
 meet again. Each one felt that the evening 
 had been most comforting, most reviving, 
 most consoHng. The sense of mutual cor-
 
 TIME, THE AVEKGER. 125 
 
 diality Tvas mingled with that secret glow 
 which a conscience gentlj approving gives to 
 the human heart. 
 
 And was not this much better than cherish- 
 ing resentment 1 Than nursing all sorts of 
 bitter feelings 1 Than the mistaken pride 
 that will not ask for a reconciliation, — the 
 mistaken dignity which will not grant it '? Is 
 not a placable temper, and a loving [heart, 
 and a warm, kindly, feeling nature, a most 
 precious thing ? Is it not like the dew whicli 
 falls on Hermon gently nourishing the love- 
 liest and tenderest flowers'? Is it not like the 
 rich ointment which fell down to the skirts 
 of Aaron's garment, and shed a rich and 
 healing perfume around 1 
 
 And when a man has done another a 
 grievous wrong, though under a mistaken 
 impression, it may be, — is it not better for 
 him to feel as this man did ; — to dwell upon 
 the sorrow, and the anguish, and the misery 
 of which he had been the cause, and not to 
 intrench himself in the proud, cold feeling, 
 that he thought he was in the right ? To be 
 bitterly remorseful for the hard judgments
 
 126 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 lie had formed, and the hard feelings he had 
 indulged, and the hard things he had done, — 
 and to be ready to break his heart for the 
 agony that had been, — though it was over 1 
 And was it not well to come to his fellow- 
 man, and to hold out the hand of reconci- 
 liation, and to saj, — " I did this thing, — but 
 you must forgive me for it, for I am very 
 sorry for that which has been done/' 
 
 Was not this good, and healing, and 
 humane, and heavenly? 
 
 I think so. 
 
 But ah! as Craiglethorpe, with a strange 
 tenderness and sense of joy stealing over him, 
 after having shaken hands with all the party 
 round, descended the stairs, and slowly re- 
 turned to that place where he had slept the 
 night before, what was it that like a cold 
 chill came over him, and blighted all these 
 genial sensations, and darkened all this bright- 
 ness 1 
 
 It was the recollection now so suddenly 
 and unaccountably revived of one, with whom 
 no such reconciliation could be made, no such 
 forgiveness exchanged; for she had sunk in a
 
 127 
 
 night of impenetrable darkness, unforgiving 
 and unforgiven. The cold iron implacable 
 heart of those days ^yas gone, but it had left 
 its chill behind it. 
 
 That picture, too! It revived these recol- 
 lections with more than common intensity — 
 thus he had seen her, exactly thus ; sitting, as if 
 for that very picture. Should he ever forget 
 that day, or her innocence, or her sweetness, 
 or her beauty '? 
 
 Or his own hard implacable and unjust 
 resentment ! 
 
 Could he think of what she might have 
 suffered, without shuddering 1 And where was 
 the excuse 1 
 
 What had she done to justify this passionate 
 sense of injury in which he had indulged ? 
 
 Ah ! it had wrenched every fibre in his 
 proud heart, then — turned to gall every senti- 
 ment of admiration and tenderness, then — But 
 how did it look now ? 
 
 That laugh — how light, how guileless ! The 
 laugh for which he had felt then he could have 
 murdered her. How sweetly, playfully, inno- 
 cently, it rang upon his memory^s ear !
 
 128 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Bj the time he had reached the old man- 
 sion and thrown himself upon his bed, Mr. 
 Oraiglethorpe had been worked up bj his 
 recollections to such a state of feeling, that I 
 question whether a more miserable man laid 
 his head upon his pillow that night, in the 
 darkest scene of the sorrow-polluted city.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 129 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 " Earthly bliss I have no other, 
 Yet from me e'en this ye sever, 
 Though he live I fain must mourn him 
 As I were a widow ever." 
 
 The Cid, 
 
 It was late before Mr. Craiglethorpe sank 
 into an uneasy slumber, but as tbe night 
 waned, bis nerves gradually composed and be 
 slept soundly. 
 
 He was awakened by some one opening the 
 door of bis room. It was a cold morning, 
 and tbe beavy rain was beard beating against 
 tbe panes ; and a rougb wind blew in gusts 
 round tbe bouse, from time to time rising into 
 violence and sbaking every window in the old 
 mansion, then subsiding into silence — again a 
 
 YOL. I. K
 
 130 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 silence, only broken by the pattering of the 
 rain drops. 
 
 An aged woman" entered the room ; she 
 brought in her hands the materials for making 
 a fire, which she began to light. As she did 
 so, kneeling down upon the hearth, her shaking 
 hands and feeble motions showed that her 
 strength was greatly impaired by years, by ill 
 health, or suffering. 
 
 From time to time, as a slight motion was 
 heard from the bed, she would turn her head 
 and look at it ; and once or twice as she did 
 so, a yague sort of dreamy recollection of 
 having seen something resembling that face 
 before, arose in Mr. Craiglethorpe's mind. But 
 the how, the when, and the where, he found it 
 impossible to recall. 
 
 When she had finished what she had to do, 
 and the fire began to blaze and crackle 
 briskly, she rose from her knees, and went to 
 the washing-stand at some little distance, and 
 began to re-arrange it ; doing everything in a 
 slow stealthy manner, as if she feared to 
 awaken the sleeper ; but with an appearance 
 of care and attention such as one bestows
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 131 
 
 upon the minor concerns of such as we know 
 and are interested in. 
 
 The Tague recollection haunted Mr. Oraigle- 
 thorpe — it worried him in his present mood 
 — he resolved to speak. The voice, as it 
 answered in reply, might furnish the wanting 
 link to unite the present and the past. 
 
 " Thank jou,'' he said ; " a little warm 
 water, please, and I shall want nothing 
 more." 
 
 " I have put the kettle upon the fire,'' she 
 replied. 
 
 And as she spoke she turned round and 
 came nearer to the bed. 
 
 She, too, seemed perusing the face that lay 
 upon the pillow before her. Their eyes met. 
 
 " Is it possible V he exclaimed. 
 
 " Ah, sir ! Ah, Mr. Oraiglethorpe \" was the 
 answer. 
 
 " Can it be possible ? Is the past not alto- 
 gether past V said he. 
 
 " Ah, sir ! Who would ever have thought 
 to see you here'?" 
 
 " Here ! — And why not here as well as any- 
 where V 
 
 K 2
 
 132 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 '• Here, sir I Ah ! do you know in -whose 
 house you are V 
 
 '' Not in the least. The house is unknown 
 to me, — a thing which rather surprised me 
 when I first entered it, I own, for from its size 
 and magnificence it must once have belonged 
 to Terj considerable people. But certainly it 
 is placed in a most obscure corner." 
 
 The old lady sighed and looked up, but she 
 said nothing to this. 
 
 "But tell me how you came here — where 
 you have been, and what has become of you 1 
 Of all with whom I left you. Good God! 
 Can it, indeed, be true ? Can they be still 
 
 living as you are still living And 
 
 where are they *? " 
 
 " Gone — gone — lost — lost. All gone — All 
 lost." 
 
 " Don't say so — don't say so," he cried 
 eagerly. " Only tell me that she still lives — 
 Any where— any how — no matter — only tell 
 me that she lives" 
 
 The old woman shook her head. 
 
 " When ? and where '? A nd how did she die V 
 
 The old woman shook her head again, in a
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 133 
 
 slow sorrowful manner, but only said, " Ah, 
 sir! if jou had been there. She wanted a 
 friend sadly, poor deserted tiling/' 
 
 " Let me get up,'' he cried, impatiently : 
 anxious to be up, to be dressed, to be in 
 action, to do something ; a wild hope was 
 springing in his breast ; " and when I am 
 dressed, come you, and tell me all about 
 yourself — and all about her," 
 
 The old lady looked somewhat surprised 
 at this passionate outburst, but only said : — 
 
 " I thought Mr. Craiglethorpe little cared 
 what became of her. If he had felt in this 
 wa}^ earlier, things might have been different." 
 
 " Well — well. Can you spare time this 
 morning, or this evening, to tell me what has 
 happened 1 This eyening would, perhaps, be 
 best for you : otherwise let it be this morn- 
 ing. I am very impatient." 
 
 " As soon as you have breakfasted, sir, it 
 shall be." 
 
 And she left the room. 
 
 He remained for some time like one who has 
 received a visit from the dead. For the past is 
 as the dead ; and, to meet suddenly one who
 
 134 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 calls up its departed visions with a fearful 
 reality, is almost as awful as to meet the dead 
 indeed. 
 
 Yes, it was she. — But how time had 
 changed her ! He had parted with her a hale, 
 active, clever woman, of about forty ; he met 
 her again, broken, worn out with age, though 
 she could not be more than seventy. 
 
 What was she now'? and what place did 
 she fill in this lone, old house? Was she the 
 mistress of it 1 Was she the wife, of whom 
 the old man had spoken as so broken with ill 
 health '? Her dress, and a something inde- 
 scribable about her appearance, inclined him 
 to conclude that she was. 
 
 Then he rose and dressed himself; and pre- 
 sently the door opened again, and the usual 
 attendant came in and put the room to rights. 
 She tlien placed the table before the fire, and 
 the tea-things and urn for breakfast upon 
 it, and set two chairs. When she was gone 
 the old lady again presented herself ; carrying, 
 as a sort of apology for coming in, a plate of 
 buttered toast. 
 
 " I thought you would like it, and have
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 135 
 
 made it myself, Mr. Craigietliorpe," slie said, 
 as she placed it upon the table. 
 
 " Thank jou ; but I am not much in the 
 humour for my breakfast," pushing his plate 
 and the untasted bread from him ; " for your 
 appearance, in this unexpected manner, has 
 called up a recollection of days gone by, which 
 disturbs me much." 
 
 " I am sure, sir," was the answer, in a 
 trembling voice, "I ought not to wonder at 
 that ; for ever since I heard your name I 
 have been strangely put about. It was so 
 long since I had seen you, and so long since 
 things had happened which I never, never can 
 forget .... and 1 had got, as it were, accus- 
 tomed to the thought .... and, indeed, life goes 
 on — and things that are past begin to appear 
 so distant and indistinct, that when the sight 
 of some person or thing revives them in this 
 lively manner — it is almost awful." 
 
 " I feel it as you say." 
 
 '' But pray take a little breakfast, sir, for 
 you don't look well," continued the old lady, 
 very kindly. 
 
 " I don't feel particularly well, I believe,
 
 136 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 but I am so little used to be out of order, 
 that I do uot know whether anything ails me 
 or not. Some things that have happened to 
 me lately have worried me a good deal. And, 
 it is odd enough, but thej have called up in 
 me retrospections which it would have been 
 better for my happiness had they never been 
 revived." 
 
 " Sir, as one grows older, things take a 
 very different colour and shape from what 
 they did in the years gone by. I find it so, 
 at least, myself — I should think it must be so 
 with others. If time could run back, how 
 differently do we think that we would then 
 have acted ; and yet, perhaps '' 
 
 " Perhaps. — I don t know. — One may regret, 
 and yet not repent." 
 
 The old lady looked down. 
 
 " If one could have prevented that which 
 one regrets, there must be a feeling of repent- 
 ance for what was left undone." 
 
 " Left undone ! That is a wide chapter 
 for any man to begin upon. There is no end 
 to these suppositions of what a man might 
 have done."
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEK. 137 
 
 " No, to be sure, there is not," and she 
 sighed again. 
 
 " But do jou think, sir, one can ever for- 
 give one's self for some acts of one's life V 
 
 " That depends upon the nature of those 
 acts/' 
 
 " We both forsook her," said the old ladj, 
 half to herself. " You, when you might have 
 saved her twice, — first from the act, and then 
 from its consequences. I, when she wanted 
 a true and helping friend, and that I was 
 whilst I staid with her, poor dear. But it's 
 all over now. The hand of God reaches us 
 even in this world ; and the heaviest punish- 
 ment that can fall upon us is to know one 
 has been wrong and unkind too late — and to 
 be denied the possibility of confessing one's 
 sorrow for it, and making atonement." 
 
 " Yes, — What you say is quite true, — too 
 true She is dead, then!" 
 
 " I believe so, — I am sure so." 
 
 " How did she die ? Tell me when it was 1 
 and where 1 and of what V 
 
 " I was not with her when she died, poor 
 dear ! but I fear it was in great misery. You,
 
 138 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 no doubt, sir, kno^Y all about the bankruptcy 
 of the House, and what followed. She fell 
 into extreme misery, sir.'' 
 
 " Extreme misery ! Don't say that ! don't 
 talk so ! It is a very shocking expression to 
 use. Because a large, flourishing fortune is 
 dissipated by folly and vice, it does not follow 
 that extreme misery must be the consequence. 
 Yet somebody did tell me they were very poor." 
 
 " Very poor ! She was at times starving, 
 — I believe she did starve." 
 
 " And where were you all the while V he 
 burst out, passionately; "What were you 
 about? Surely a faithful servant — a clever 
 woman like you, might at least have contrived 
 so that no one you cared for, in this world, 
 should starve ! Don't talk in this manner — 
 You know I hate exaggeration — and it breaks 
 my heart." 
 
 "Where was I? Alas! alas! That's the 
 sin and the pity ; — I left her," 
 
 " You forsook her, then, as well as others," 
 and, true to his own cold nature, by this 
 companionship in wrong, he felt visibly com- 
 forted ; by this comparison with a barbarity
 
 TIME, THE AVE^^GEE. 139 
 
 wliicli lie held to be still greater than his own, 
 he felt himself, in some manner, excused. 
 " You forsook her, then, as well as others," he 
 repeated, and then he went on impetuously : 
 "But when, tell me when, and how did 
 you leave her'? Common report, of course, 
 informed me of the great catastrophe, but it 
 w^as no affair of mine, — at least, so I thought 
 then, — and I never made any inquiry as to 
 what became of her— personally 
 
 " One looks back upon life," he went on, 
 after a silence of some minutes, in which he 
 seemed lost in his own reflections, — "one 
 looks back upon life and one marvels at one's 
 self. The passions which actuated the man 
 years ago fade, as all perishable things fade, 
 and are lost to the recollection. The wrong 
 they have led us to do remains — ineffaceable 
 — a positive, unalterable, irreparable thing. 
 Wrong and right are the only enduring sub- 
 stance of man's life then — The rest is but as a 
 shadow that passe th away." 
 
 This was said rather as a reflection made to 
 himself, than as intended for his companion.
 
 140 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 But she took up tlie allusion to Scripture, 
 and in a low tone repeated : — 
 
 " Man is lihe to vanity, and his days are as 
 a shadow that passeth atvay; his breath goeth 
 forth, he returneth to his earth, that very day 
 his thoughts perish. 
 
 " But the mercy of the Lord is from ever- 
 lasting to everlasting upon those that fear 
 Him; and His righteousness unto children's 
 children ; to such as heep his covenant, and to 
 those that remember his commandments to 
 do them!' 
 
 " You left her, then V again he resumed. 
 "Everybody, I suppose, forsook her in her 
 adversity. It is the way of the world." 
 
 " No, sir ; not in her adversity. I was not 
 so bad as that. She was in her prosperity 
 when I left her ; but I knew she needed me 
 even then — but I was selfish and proud, and I 
 chose to go.'' 
 
 "Whyr 
 
 "Sir— I married " 
 
 " You only imitated your young lady, then. 
 No great harm, I suppose, in that. Though she
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 141 
 
 was but sixteen, and jou must have been hard 
 upon forty," he said, in a sarcastic tone of 
 voice. 
 
 " No, sir — no great harm, as voii say ; and 
 jet, I have felt since, as if it were almost a 
 crime. She had been committed, as it were, 
 by her poor dear father to my care, as well as 
 to yours, sir." 
 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe writhed as one does under 
 a sudden stab of acute pain. 
 
 " And because one had forsaken her, it was 
 more incumbent upon the other to stay," Mrs. 
 Benfield went on ; " but you cannot have for- 
 gotten how it used to be with her, sir. Head- 
 strong, wilful, impetuous she was, yet, her 
 heart always in the right place — always faith- 
 ful and loving, whatever in her sport or her 
 anger, she might say to vex one. She had 
 tried me often and often, but never did I think 
 to leave her. It was my duty to contradict 
 her, you know, and to stand her little humours 
 when I did so — for you may recollect she did 
 not like contradiction. The more on that 
 account she stood in want of a true friend — 
 such as you could have been, and I strove to 
 be."
 
 142 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " True friend ! Could liaye been ! Why do 
 you torment me with such expressions as these ? 
 You know yery well, if you know anything at 
 all, that she hated and despised me — ridiculed 
 and held cheap, both myself and my advice.'^ 
 
 " Ah, Mr. Craiglethorpe T 
 
 " Don't ah Mr. Craiglethorpe me, with that 
 dolorous Yoice," said he, with extraordinary 
 irritation of manner. " You know that so it 
 was. Why torment me with this pretended, 
 affected contradiction 1 
 
 " I know very well," he went on, in a hoarse, 
 hurried voice, " what I was in those days, and 
 what I must have appeared to her — what I 
 did appear to her. I have not forgotten — I 
 never can forget, the contemptuous ridicule 
 with which she treated her father's friend. As 
 her father's friend, I thought, and I think still, 
 that I deserved more respect at her hands. 
 But why — why do I recall this?' his voice 
 softening and saddening again. 
 
 " She was a child — a mere child at that 
 time. She was but sixteen, recollect, sir." 
 
 " You need not remind me of that. There 
 it all lies. She appeared to me as a woman.
 
 TIME, THE AYEKGER. 143 
 
 then, — now, to mj eternal regret, I can only 
 think of her as a child. But it seems you 
 forgot this as well as I did, at the time. But 
 go on." 
 
 " I did, sir — I did ; I own it — or rather 
 after I married, I did. It was different. One 
 has a divided heart then, jou know. They 
 say loYe is generous. I don't know that, — All 
 I know is, it made me selfish — I was not sorry 
 to find an excuse, perhaps, to go ; and when 
 in a passion of anger she bade me leave her, 
 I did leave her, and went to the Levant with 
 my old man, — whom, heaven forgive me, I 
 never loved half as I loved her — But that I 
 found out too late." 
 
 " She could be in a passion even with you, 
 then, at times, it seems," said he. 
 
 " Ah, sir ! what brief storms ! — And mostly 
 ending in a flood of tears, and her arms round 
 your neck in a moment, asking forgiveness. 
 But there was one subject upon which she 
 could not bear to be remonstrated with — her 
 husband " 
 
 At that word Mr. Craiglethorpe started 
 suddenly from his chair, and strange passions 
 disturbed his face — anger and pain, jealousy
 
 144 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 and despair. But lie said nothing, and after 
 Laving taken a turn or two across the room, sat 
 down again, and Mrs. Benfield went on : — 
 
 " It seemed as if she could not bear to hear 
 the truth upon that subject — was determined 
 to persist in the most obstinate blindness. It 
 was too late, to be sure, to save her, as might 
 have been done, perhaps ^' 
 
 " Might have been done, perhaps ! Have 
 done with these inuendoes. What is the use 
 of this indulgence of an almost malicious plea- 
 sure in tormenting '? Might have been done ! 
 Vain taunt ! Who knows what might have 
 been done 1 Empty retrospection ! W^ho can 
 pretend to say of anything what might have 
 been done V^ 
 
 " I beg your pardon, sir.'' 
 
 " Well — well ; go on. What ! you quar- 
 relled about her husband, did you, after all ? 
 You were a rasb woman to venture upon such 
 ground. Wise friends hold their tongues in 
 such cases. What's the use of coming between 
 the bark and the tree V 
 
 " Ah, sir ! but it was necessary she should 
 be warned. Things were going on at such a 
 rate ; and she had influence — no doubt she
 
 145 
 
 had, eren to the last. She might have done 
 something, perhaps, could she have been per- 
 suaded to use it in time.'^ 
 
 " And jou strove to do good bj awakening 
 her to a sense of her Imsband's faults. I 
 should not have expected such nonsense from 
 a woman like jou. — Do jou not know that the 
 more rash and mad a woman's choice has been, 
 the more obstinately she upholds it, in defiance 
 of the world. She might have learned some- 
 thing if she had chosen to listen before it was 
 too late ; but in her headstrong indulgence of 
 her fancy, she closed her ears to every warning." 
 
 " I don't know what warning she had," said 
 Mrs. Benfield, bluntly, for she was as fearless 
 in expressing her thoughts when once excited, 
 as Mr. Craiglethorpe himself. — " I never knew 
 that she had any warning. — The more the 
 shame on those who might have given it if they 
 chose, and did not. I was not one of them. 
 I had no reason at that time to think Valentine 
 Daubeney an unfit choice for Lilla Fleming." 
 
 " He was very handsome, if you mean that," 
 said Mr. Craiglethorpe, bitterly, " and passing 
 
 YOL. I. L 
 
 I
 
 146 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 rich. I suppose that's enough, in the eyes of 
 any woman, to constitute a man a fit match." 
 
 " No, sir, there you are unjust. Women 
 have more value for sterling qualities than 
 men are apt to think — and it Tvas not Lilla 
 Fleming's fault, that her heart did not give 
 itself to one, who, in spite of his faults — and 
 they were many — had qualities, I believe, which 
 made him truly worthy of her.'^ 
 
 " What do you mean 1 — What can you 
 mean'? — Give her heart ! — There was no other? 
 unfortunately, that she could have given it to 
 but that Daubeney. All the other young fellows 
 she saw were too greatly her inferiors — the 
 more the pity/' 
 
 " Sir, young girls of her age do not always 
 look upon youth as the first qualification." 
 
 •' No !— What ! 
 
 " Sir, the pride of men's hearts is great, 
 and so is the pride of a young, spoiled, beau* 
 tiful girl. Either would rather die than own 
 to a preference they do not believe to be 
 returned, I have seen a man treating the 
 woman he doated on with harshness and in- 
 justice ; because he did not believe she loved
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 147 
 
 him as, in bis liauglitj self-esteem, he thought 
 he deserved. I have seen a woman hurt, 
 aHenated, lost, bj such treatment ; when a 
 little tender softness would have brought her 
 to his feet. People's evil qualities, and peo- 
 ple's line qualities, alike conspire to divide loving 
 hearts in some cases. — Alas, the pity \" 
 
 " Woman !" he said, and fixed his ejes 
 sternly upon her, — " Your speech is ambi- 
 guous. Would you wish to drive me mad V 
 
 She was silenced. 
 
 " TeU me," he cried ; " Speak ! Tell me.— 
 I insist upon knowing what you mean, though 
 it sliould — though it will kill me I" 
 
 He was dreadfully excited. 
 
 She looked at him wistfully, — sorrowfully, — 
 regretfully, — then the tears gathered to her 
 eyes, and began to roll slowly over her cheeks. 
 
 " It is for me to cry — to weep tears of 
 blood,'' he passionately exclaimed, irritated 
 rather than calmed by seeing her ; — " What 
 do t/ou shed tears for V 
 
 " Ah, the pity ! — the pity !" said she sor- 
 rowfully, shaking her head. 
 
 L 2
 
 148 TIME, THE AYEXGEK. 
 
 " Don't keep repeating these silly lamenta- 
 tions. — Tell me at once, did you mean to insi- 
 nuate anything — or what did you mean to 
 insinuate by that which you have just said'?" 
 
 " I begin to suspect, sir," she replied, wiping 
 her eyes with her handkerchief, and endeavour- 
 ing to speak calmly, " I begin to suspect .... 
 but my suspicions come too late. What mis- 
 takes we have all been in ! If I had but 
 knou'n sooner, what I believe, I have learned 
 to-day, all I can say is — my lovely Lilla 
 Fleming should never have been the wife of 
 Valentine Daubeney." 
 
 But before I continue the conversation that 
 endued between these two, it will be necessary 
 for me to make a long pause, and to fill it up 
 with relating to you certain circumstances, and 
 certain events, which took place years before, 
 in order that you may comprehend the above 
 conversation. And thus I will link together, 
 as well as I can, the different fragments as I 
 may call them, of this retrospective history.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 149 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 " With no iron was it barbed 
 
 Yet hath wounded sore my heart- 
 Healing balm I none may hope for. 
 But for aye must bear the smart." 
 
 The Gid. 
 
 Shakespeaee takes the liberty, in his 
 Winter's Tale, to introduce, in the course of 
 one short drama, an interval of about eighteen 
 years. 
 
 I wish I were but entitled by the approach 
 witliin a thousand degrees, to take the same 
 license as he does, for I am going, in my little 
 way, to venture almost as far, perhaps farther. 
 To skip several years forwards has always been 
 allowed ; but I am now going, in the wide
 
 150 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 
 
 walk of the narrative, to task your indulgence 
 more freely, to ask jour leave to skip back- 
 wards. 
 
 My principal purpose, when I began this 
 history, was to relate to you what were the 
 circumstances, what the passions, and above all, 
 what were the good and evil tempers, which 
 now revived after the lapse of so many years, 
 gave birth, in the bosom of the awakened man, 
 to sensations of such poignant regret. 
 
 The story will be told partly as it occurred 
 externally, and as it affected Mr. Craiglethorpe 
 at the time ; partly in its internal history, 
 and how it affected one of the sufferers when 
 the events occurred, and lastly, how the 
 knowledge of the true interpretation of the 
 whole influenced the other now. 
 
 It is a fine summer afternoon. 
 
 The sun is shining brightly upon the Thames, 
 and a fresh westerly wind is bringing quite a 
 crowd of ships up the river ; their sails all set.
 
 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 151 
 
 and swelling their white bosoms to the gale^ as 
 borne upon its wings, thej speed rapidly for- 
 wards. Craft of every description is mingled 
 together ; the snow-white canvass of the huge 
 three-master, the dingy blackened sails of the 
 Newcastle collier, the red and brown of the 
 low, heavy, river craft, and little sloops like sea- 
 swallows, scudding gaily along. 
 
 A beautiful evening and a beautiful scene. 
 
 It was before the days of steamers ; and a 
 fair wind for coming up the river was a matter 
 of much more importance than it is now ; for 
 the river was sure to be crowded with vessels 
 awaiting it, as was the quay, with the ex- 
 pectant friends watching for the new arrivals. 
 
 There was, as usual, a motley crowd assem- 
 bled there. All sorts of people; gentle and 
 simple, men and women, awaiting the coming 
 of the various voyagers from every quarter of 
 the globe, who, in consequence of the favour- 
 able change in the wind, were expected to 
 come up the river that night. Eager faces — 
 anxious faces — joyous faces — calculating faces. 
 Women of the commoner sort, and well dressed
 
 152 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 ladies ; gentlemen, and tlie rough population 
 of the river's banks. All packed closely toge- 
 ther; and all watching the different vessels 
 vv'ith anxiety and impatience; endeavouring to 
 discover the one which held the freight of love 
 or lucre expected by tliem. 
 
 There were children of all ages holding the 
 hands of many of these well-dressed women, 
 looking out for the return of father or mother, 
 whom they had been taught to love, but from 
 whom they might have been separated for years. 
 There were fathers and mothers, sisters and 
 brothers, and above all, wives, — almost in an 
 agony of love, awaiting the return of the long- 
 parted treasures to their hearts and homes. 
 
 Then, there was, as usual, a great scrambling 
 among the lower sort, to secure their share in 
 such occupation as the arrival of so many 
 vessels might present ; and altogether, the 
 pushing and the scrambling, and the hubbub 
 of voices was confounding. 
 
 It must be remarked, too, that this was all 
 increased by the necessity, at that time of day, 
 of everybody being landed by wherries ; there
 
 TIME, THE AYEXGEE. 153 
 
 being no means for tlie sliips which carried 
 passengers to approach close to the quay, as 
 they do now. So gentlemen might be seen 
 engaging these light boats, and pushing about 
 in them ; much to the increase of the general 
 feeling of nervous excitement in the women 
 watching above. For, in a confusion of this 
 sort, the narrow wherry, and even the longer 
 and wider boat, appear a very insecure method 
 of getting to land. More dangerous, appa- 
 rently, than any of the perils encountered in 
 the deep and solitary sea; though I suppose, 
 accidents rarely happened. 
 
 In the crowd upon the quay stood a gentle- 
 man watching the ships as they came swiftly 
 up the river ; and among the carriages which 
 were crowded together at a little distance, was 
 one handsome and well-appointed chariot, 
 rather more elaborate and substantial than was 
 at that time exactly the fashion. It was drawn 
 by a pair of bay horses, in the same character 
 as regarded their own build and accoutrements, 
 all being very handsome, and rather elaborate ; 
 and had a hammer-cloth for the coachman
 
 154 TIME, THE AAn::NGER. 
 
 and footmen in attendance, all accordiug to 
 the then citj mode. 
 
 In the carriage sat a youngish lady of about 
 eight-and-twenty, or thirty, earnestly a\yaitiDg 
 an arrival, too. 
 
 The gentleman was, I believe, about thirty 
 years of age, or may be rather less than that him- 
 self, but he looked considerably older. He was 
 of a small spare figure, rather below than above 
 the common size ; had features not positively 
 ugly, but what we mean by the word plain. I 
 once heard a first-rate authority. Sir James 
 Mackintosh, object to this word used in the 
 sense in which I now use it, and say, if I 
 recollect right, that it was a cant word, and 
 had no specific meaning. With the gi'eatest 
 deference to any opinion of his, I must allow 
 myself to differ from this, for I ihmk plain as 
 applied to the human face, has a very distinct 
 meaning, and one which no other word in the 
 language will adequately give. 
 
 We mean by it just what I wished to express 
 above ; the absence of all beauty without posi- 
 tive ugliness. Nothing in the proportions or
 
 TIME, THE AVE]!^GER. 155 
 
 outline of the features wliicli deviates from the 
 proper type so far as to approach deformity 
 or eccentricity ; but something entirely devoid 
 of that pleasing charm which constitutes our 
 vague notion of beauty. Such \Yas this gentle- 
 man's face. The features were not positively 
 irregular; but there was nothing to please in 
 their outlines, their arrangement, or their sym- 
 metry. The complexion was free from defect, 
 but it was very sallow; the hair neither red, 
 nor sandy, nor coarse black, but of a good 
 brown colour, and proper texture ; yet scanty, 
 and some way ill planted. The figure w^ell 
 proportioned enough; but yet ill hung, grace- 
 less, and therefore unpleasing. He was plain, 
 in short. The only redeeming part being a pair 
 of dark eyes, piercing as those of the hawk; 
 intelligent, penetrating, changeful. Usually 
 fixed in thought, earnest, sincere, and firm; 
 but at intervals flashing with a wild and pas- 
 sionate fire. These intervals were, however, 
 so rare, that they gave little interest to a face 
 which, in general, must have been pronounced 
 one that might be imposing, but could not be 
 interesting.
 
 156 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 He was clothed in a very plain garb of 
 brown, a dress, be it observed, be never 
 altered. It was the only mere whim in which 
 he was known to indulge himself. Suits of 
 one colour were not quite gone out in his day ; 
 he was one of the few who retained the fashion 
 to the day of his death, I believe. 
 
 Well, he stood there holdiug a small tele- 
 scope in his hand, which he now and then 
 applied to his eye, until he seemed to have 
 distinguished the vessel he was watching for. 
 The " Caroline," from the Levant it was. And, 
 so soon as the fair vessel was distinguishable, 
 bounding over the water like a sea-bird, — every 
 sail, to the very highest sky-scraper, set, and 
 filled with the favouring wind, — no sooner 
 did he see her coming up, dashing the water 
 gaily from her prow, as it fell in showers, 
 glittering with broken sunbeams on each side, 
 — than he descended the ladder. Doing this, 
 however, without fuss or hurry, — in a delibe- 
 rate way of his own, which contrasted with 
 the bustling impatience of those around him. 
 Having made a signal for a wherry, he entered
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 157 
 
 it, and sat qnietlj down, expecting, till the 
 vessel should cast anchor, which she speedily 
 did. 
 
 He then made his Avay to tlie side, and 
 ascended it with his usual deliberation. 
 
 People were climbing up the ladder before 
 him, and pressing forwards behind him; but 
 it seemed as if nothing could put him into a 
 Imrrj. The deck, when he mounted it, was 
 already crowded with passengers impatient 
 to land, and friends and relations pressing 
 forward to welcome them. The air was 
 iilled with a confused murmur of joyful 
 greetings and congratulations ; embraces and 
 kisses were being exchanged, and tears of joy 
 were falling from many eyes. With a coun- 
 tenance quite unmoved, the gentleman we 
 are watching made his way through the press, 
 and approaching the Captain of the vessel, 
 asked him whether there was not a young lady 
 named Miss Fleming, with her attendants, on 
 board ; all consigned to the care of Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe. 
 
 The reply was in the affirmative ; and the 
 Captain, casting a glance over the crowd
 
 158 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 which thronged the deck, pointed out a young 
 lady in mourning, who stood a little apart, 
 attended by two or three servants, and two 
 very well dressed women, who appeared, never- 
 theless, to be her servants. One of these was 
 of middle age, the other female attendant 
 young, like herself. There were also two men 
 servants, dressed in handsome, though rather 
 singular-looking liveries. 
 
 '' That's Miss Fleming,'' said the Captain, 
 and turned away, too busy to say more. 
 
 Mr. Oraiglethorpe made his way to the 
 little group. 
 
 A very young girl, about fifteen or sixteen 
 years old, stood there, surrounded by her 
 attendants ; the slenderness, and something 
 particularly graceful, ondoyante, as the French 
 say, in her figure, distinguished her among her 
 companions. 
 
 She had on a large bonnet, to shelter her 
 from the sun, which completely concealed her 
 face. 
 
 "Miss Fleming, I presume," said Mr. 
 Oraiglethorpe. 
 
 And the young lady turned round, and
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 159 
 
 presented — oli, such a sweet, bewitching coun- 
 tenance ! 
 
 Miss Fleming was extremely, perfectly 
 beautiful ; but she was more than that. It 
 is rare that features formed in perfect sym- 
 metry are capable of conyeying such a wild, 
 bewitching, fascinating expression as did hers. 
 
 Bewitching and fascinating are words of 
 course, — but, when justly applied, words of 
 strange force and meaning. Words which 
 imply a power unaccountable but irresistible ; 
 and which suffice, in some instances, by one 
 glance to decide upon the destiny of a life. 
 
 He was no admirer of the beautiful sex ; 
 he had little eye for beauty, and had been 
 almost insensible to female charm : in fact, 
 he had a secret contempt for all women. 
 
 It was like the lightning flash when that 
 sweet face, as she turned suddenly round, 
 beamed full upon him. 
 
 He was struck, and to the heart — at once, 
 and for ever. 
 
 He felt strangely. 
 
 Admiration! — Such a sudden and intense 
 feeling of admiration and delight was, indeed,
 
 IGO TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 new to him. He was confused, dazzled, 
 bewildered, like one who, from darkness, is 
 suddenly brought where there is great light. 
 
 He was speechless for the first few seconds ; 
 he stood there like one transfixed. 
 
 She, her sweet eyes bent upon him with 
 a look of innocent surprise and curiosity, 
 gazed at the strange man of whom she had 
 heard much, and to whose care she was to be 
 intrusted. 
 
 The unwonted passion held him silent but 
 for an instant or two, then he was his own 
 master again — and approaching her, but with 
 a softness and almost deference which he 
 had never been known to display before, he 
 said : 
 
 " My name is Craigle thorp e," he began . 
 " Your father, Miss Fleming, was my dear 
 friend, and he has honoured me by intrusting 
 you to my charge. I am happy to see you 
 in England.'' 
 
 She held out her hand to her father's 
 friend. He took it and gently pressed it 
 between both his. It was the first time in 
 his life, I believe, that he had even given such
 
 TIME, THE AVEN-GER. 161 
 
 a token of sensibility, — but there was a soft- 
 ness in her face, a wild, yet most dangerous 
 sweetness, that seemed to pervade the very 
 atmosphere around her. 
 
 " I hope you are not much tired with your 
 voyage. It has been a long one, but I trust 
 has been favourable, upon the whole. Are you 
 very much tired of being on ship-board V he 
 went on. 
 
 " Oh, very much, indeed, and shall be glad 
 to land,^"* said she, looking round ; but as her 
 eye glanced at the murky sky obscured with 
 smoke, at the blackened ships lying crowded 
 on every side, at the hideous edifices that here 
 deform the banks of the river, her countenance 
 fell, — she thought of the skies and gardens 
 of the East, — and she added, "I beheve I 
 shall, at least." 
 
 He turned away to order the boat to the 
 side, then returned, held out his arm, and 
 said : 
 
 " My sister, Mrs. Selwyn, is waiting for you 
 in her carriage ; will you come ? Ha I Mrs. 
 Benfield," turning to the older attendant, 
 
 YOL. I. M
 
 162 TIME, THE AYEXGER. 
 
 " joii here ! I am glad to see jou looking so 
 well/' 
 
 The person he addressed as Mrs. Benfield was 
 the Yerj Mrs. Benfield with whom ^Ir. Craigle- 
 thorpe was breakfasting when we left him — she 
 was a plain, serious-looking woman, but with 
 an air of intellect and command above her 
 station. She had been Lilians attendant ever 
 since she was twelve months old, filling the 
 office of half-governess, half-nurse. She per- 
 fectly well remembered Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 though it was now ten years since she had 
 seen him, and was glad to surrender her charge 
 to his care. She curtsied respectfully, and 
 prepared, with the other women, to follow her 
 young mistress to the boat. 
 
 " I was not aware you had so many attend- 
 ants. Miss Fleming," Mr. Craiglethorpe went 
 on, again addressing Lilla. " I have ordered 
 a large boat to carry your luggage; but I have 
 only a little wherry down there for you. It 
 will, however, hold you and your women- 
 servants safely enough, if you are not 
 afraid."
 
 TIME, THE AVEI^GER. 163 
 
 " Afraid ! oh, no !" with a smile. " I am 
 not much given to being afraid; and I shall be 
 so glad to get on shore. But what a horrid 
 uglj place this grand London is, after all I" 
 
 " Do jou think so ?" looking round, and for 
 the first time observing whether it were ugly 
 or not. " Yes — certainly — so it is, viewed from 
 this point; but you will find it difi'erent at 
 others, and like it better, I hope." 
 
 " Oh dear ! so do I ; for this is hideous. 
 But ah r — as the sun suddenly burst from 
 behind a cloud — " there is the sun to be seen, 
 thank goodness ; and they told me England 
 lay under a perpetual fog — That^s not true, it 
 seems. But was there ever anything so black 
 and dismal as the banks of this nasty river ?" 
 
 Again he cast a hasty glance round upon 
 that river of which he had never before thought, 
 either as ugly or beautiful ; for little enough 
 had he troubled himself before with the beauty 
 or ugliness of anything. The Thames was the 
 gi'and high-road for the nations to him — 
 London the grand emporium of commerce ; 
 and that was all he cared about. He looked 
 
 M 2
 
 164 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 at it now in a new sense — smiled a grim sort 
 of smile — and repeated that it was disagree- 
 ably ugly ; but that he hoped she would like 
 things better as she saw more ; and then held 
 out his hand, to help the fair young creature 
 into the wherry. 
 
 With a pretty affectation, daintily she 
 stepped along the deck ; for young coquette, 
 alas ! she was already. Early as were her 
 years, in the society from which she had come 
 she had been considered and treated quite as 
 a woman grown ; and innocent as was her 
 heart, she had been accustomed to take her 
 place in society, and to expect and receive un- 
 bounded admiration. All this when she was, 
 in fact, a mere child, though a very forward 
 and clever child ; but it was impossible that 
 such a training, acting upon the giddy head 
 and wild imagination of one so young, should 
 not have been injurious. 
 
 She came, in fact, from the Levant — from 
 the East — where she had lived since her 
 earliest childhood ; and there she had been 
 accustomed to see the empire of personal
 
 TIME, THE AVENaER. 165 
 
 charms considered as invincible, and female 
 education only directed to tlie enhancing of 
 such charms to the highest possible degree. 
 The cultivation of a woman's intellect would, 
 in the society which she had frequented, have 
 been considered as too enormous an absurdity ; 
 and moral discipline was almost as little 
 attended to as mental training — that is to 
 say, the more refined and higher principles of 
 morals ; for the obvious duties of womanhood 
 she had been taught as a matter of course, 
 supported by the mere ordinary sanctions of 
 religion. But this was all Lilla had learned 
 from those around her. 
 
 She had been told there was another world, 
 but she had been accustomed to live for this — 
 that there were certain rules of morality which 
 it was a crime, or rather a disgrace, to break ; 
 but the more delicate perception of what was 
 right and wrong, the sense of the depth and 
 reality of religious obligation, had not entered 
 into the head of her teachers, nor, of course, 
 been instilled into her own. 
 
 Nature, however, had been bountiful. Lilla
 
 166 TIME, THE AVENGES. 
 
 was, it is true, a good deal spoiled ; still slie 
 was a gaj, guileless, innocent creature, and 
 in her untaught simplicity and singleness of 
 heart, might have put to shame many a 
 better instructed one. She was careless and 
 thoughtless, but it was a most amiable 
 thoughtlessness. Lilla would not wilfully have 
 given pain to any breathing thing. But there 
 was something more earnest than herself or 
 others were aware behind the sweet cordiality 
 of her gay nature : she was capable of deep 
 affections, of intense feelings, but life had as 
 yet given little occasion to call them forth. 
 
 As it was, the graces of her beautiful form 
 and the charms of her lovely face were, in 
 some degree, enhanced by this airy w^ant of 
 sober thought ; and were augmented still further 
 by a sort of instinctive coquetr}^ which she had 
 never been taught to check, and which had at 
 least the good effect of giving her that desire 
 to please which rendered her so universally 
 pleasing. 
 
 So, hanging upon his arm, she stepped 
 across the deck with her delicate little feet>
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 167 
 
 SO daintily, as I said ; and when he put her 
 into the wherrj, there were such a thousand 
 charming little ways of expressing her diffi- 
 culties and her fears, that he thought never 
 was anything so pretty ; and he, the most in- 
 tolerant man in the world for anything that 
 approached to female affectation, and the most 
 contemptuous to any exhibition of female 
 weakness, found all this pretty display of 
 girlish affectation irresistibly charming, and 
 seated her at last in the wherry, and himself 
 by her side with a feehng of pleasure strange 
 and new. And, as the boat shot across the 
 water, she, who seemed on her side to have 
 taken an odd sort of liking to her conductor, 
 prattled away so sweetly and so easily, that 
 by the time they reached the ladder by which 
 they were to ascend to the platform, the stoical 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe was in a humour to feel as 
 if the mere assisting her up the steps was the 
 most honourable and delightful office he had 
 ever been called upon in his life to perform. 
 
 " The pavement is quite dry," said he, as 
 they crossed the quay, glancing down, as he
 
 168 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 spoke, at the delicate tliin slices, which 
 clothed feet more fit to dance a fairy ring upon 
 the yellow sands, than to walk over a London 
 pavement — " and my sister's carriage is not 
 far distant. If I were to attempt to get it up 
 here through this mess, you might have to wait 
 half an hour — can you venture to take my 
 arm, and walk so far with me 1 You can do 
 it quite safely, I assure you." 
 
 " Oh yes — anything, with pleasure, to get 
 out of this — but what are my poor women to 
 
 dor 
 
 " Let your women stay here till I have dis- 
 posed of you ; and then I will come back and 
 see them safe." 
 
 The slender arm was again laid within his, 
 and they began to creep under horses' noses, 
 and to run between poles and wheels ; he 
 guarding her with a tender care and atten- 
 tion delightful to him and not unpleasing to 
 her ; till they arrived safely, as people always 
 do through such perils, at the handsome car- 
 riage, in which sat a lady expecting. The gay 
 trappings of this carriage, the abundant gild-
 
 169 
 
 iug, and the huge coat of arms upou the pan- 
 iiels, looked very gorgeous, and struck the 
 fancy of the young girl not unpleasantly; for 
 she loved all that was gay and bright, and was 
 already sick and almost terrified at the mono- 
 tonous dullness of colouring: which Endand had 
 as yet presented, and which she painfully con- 
 trasted with her recollections of the variety 
 and magnificence of the East. 
 
 She got into the carriage with most cheerful 
 alacrity, and received the civilities of the lady, 
 to whom she was presented, with many sweet 
 and pleasant smiles ; then turning to Oraigle- 
 thorpe, who stood there still holding the car- 
 riage door, she thanked him, almost as if he 
 had been an old acquaintance, for the care he 
 had taken of her, and begged him to be so 
 kind as to have her poor desolate damsels 
 looked after. 
 
 He had been her first acquaintance in Eng- 
 land ; and though the meeting had taken place 
 but about a quarter of an hour ago, — when he 
 introduced the lady in the carriage to her, as 
 his sister Mrs. Selwyn, she felt, what she al-
 
 170 
 
 ways continued to feel, that he was the old 
 friend of the two. 
 
 She had now time to return the civilities of 
 Mrs. Selwjn, who, at the first glance, had quite 
 satisfied the requirements of her superficial 
 experience. She was as well pleased with the 
 aspect of the handsome ladj who sat within 
 the carriage, as with that of the handsome 
 carriage which held the ladj. 
 
 Mrs. Selwyn was fair to look upon, for 
 though not particularly well looking, she was 
 yery particularly well, not to say elaborately, 
 dressed. She had on an open pelisse of very 
 handsome purple silk, displaying beneath it 
 a muslin petticoat trimmed with embroidery 
 and lace. Abundance of fine lace graced the 
 regions of the tippet, and a white silk bonnet, 
 with a plume of white feathers, purple-tipped, 
 waving lightly over it, covered her head. 
 Gold and hair bracelets in profusion ; a very 
 handsome, not to say splendid, mosaic brooch, 
 completed her toilette. 
 
 The carriage, was lined with watered silk, 
 and adorned with very rich lace, and, to
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. l7l 
 
 a lover of gaj things, gay colours, gay scenes, 
 which Lilla certainly was in an eminent de- 
 gree — nothing could appear more promising. 
 So she, who was of a particularly frank and 
 cordial temper, and had not a notion of such 
 things as reserve or disguise, met the advances 
 to acquaintance made by Mrs. Selwyn most 
 readily : and before Mr. Craiglethorpe and 
 Thomas, the footman, returned, after seeing 
 the women servants safe in a hackney-coach, 
 she seemed, as she felt 'herself already, quite 
 content, and at ease. 
 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe came to the carriage-door 
 again, and looked in. 
 
 '• Will you not come down with us to the 
 Forest, brother, to-night,'' said Mrs. Selwyn. 
 
 "I ought to be in the city," he replied, 
 shaking his head. 
 
 " Oh ! do come," she cried, drawing Lilla a 
 little nearer to herself — " We can make plenty 
 of room for him, can't we, Miss Fleming V 
 
 " I ought to be in Fenchurch Street at this 
 moment," persisted he. 
 
 *' Fenchurch Street !'^ said his sister, " Come 
 along with us."
 
 172 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Lilla looked excessively pretty as she moved 
 a little towards Mrs. Sehvyn, and seemed to 
 make way for him ; clearing aside her dress 
 a little with her pretty hand, looking down 
 upon the carriage floor all the time, w'ith such 
 a sweet, conscious look. 
 
 He hesitated a little longer, then he sud- 
 denly put his foot upon the step, and got, or 
 rather tumbled in. 
 
 Awkwardly enough. — 
 
 And she smiled. 
 
 Was it at his awkward way — was it at his 
 infirmity of purpose — was it at the pleasing 
 sense of her own power, already attained ? — 
 All these mingled together, perhaps. 
 
 She was pleasant as they w^ent along, and 
 Craiglethorpe sat there wdth the two women, 
 as if in a new element ; observing her pretty 
 ways, and listening to her engaging, half 
 childish, half womanly, half simple, half clever, 
 but always lively chat. Now she was abusing 
 the narrow lanes of the city through which 
 they passed ; now filled with surprise and 
 admiration at the wealth and splendour of the
 
 TIME, THE AVEKGER. 173 
 
 large shops, as thej drove down tlie more im- 
 portant streets. But all tliese feelings merged 
 in unaffected ecstacj as, at length, after tra- 
 versing Hacknej and the wretched suburbs on 
 the Essex side of London, thej entered at last 
 beautiful Epping Forest, with its broken wood- 
 land landscapes, its wild oaks and elms, and 
 rugged old thorns — its gleaming waters, and 
 its turfy glades — upon which the declining 
 sun was shining ; tipping the trees v/ith golden 
 light, and casting deep, mysterious shadows 
 beneath their branches. 
 
 They drove a considerable way through this 
 charming scenery, and then turning through a 
 pair of handsome iron gates, and passing be- 
 neath the arching boughs of a magnificent 
 shrubbery, they finally stopped at the door of 
 Mrs. Selwyn's villa, or rather very handsome 
 country house. 
 
 It seemed as if Lilla at last wanted words 
 to express her admiration and delight. Really 
 moved by the wonderful beauty of the scene 
 — she was silent — She was one alwavs silent 
 when deeply touched, and she was deeply
 
 174 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 touched now. After the confinement of ship- 
 board — after the monotonous circle of unbroken 
 sea and sk j, these lovelj English scenes filled her 
 heart with a sense of beauty almost overwhelm- 
 ing; and, as usual, when her feelings were excited, 
 she was grave. He noticed the silence which 
 had succeeded to her previous gaiety — but he 
 understood it not. Alas, thus early his mis- 
 conceptions began ! He fancied she was dis- 
 satisfied — he feared she was disappointed — 
 he did not know what to make of it — he felt 
 troubled, but he said nothing. 
 
 Mrs. Selwyn's villa was really a beautiful 
 thing. It lay so completely surrounded and 
 embowered with trees that the grounds were 
 perfectly impenetrable from without ; and you 
 felt as entirely secluded from impertinent 
 gazers as when Epping Forest was a forest 
 indeed, where the wild deer belled, and the 
 huntsman's horn alone startled its solitudes. 
 
 The house was large and handsome, but 
 of an irregular form and picturesque style of 
 architecture ; full of pinnacles and points, and 
 angles and turrets, with windows in every
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 175 
 
 direction, and of all sorts of sizes. There 
 ^vere yerandalis here and balconies there, all 
 in a most agreeable confusion ; and the 
 verandahs and balconies which were visible 
 being crowded with the finest flowers in full 
 blow, looked excessively gay and pleasant. 
 
 Fine lawns of grass, smooth as velvet, 
 interspersed with shrubbery knots and noble 
 single trees, — beds of flowers, winding walks, 
 ■ — fountains, little transparent pools, from 
 which the water fell in tiny cataracts over 
 great conch shells, — most agreeably amused 
 the eye, and concealed the real extent of the 
 domain ; for all was laid out with so much 
 art as to make it appear of twice the size that 
 it really was. 
 
 And the variety of walks with which the 
 grounds were intersected, running here and 
 there, and round and round, in pleasant 
 interstices, rendered this deception, if decep- 
 tion is the word, almost as good as the 
 reality. For there was a much greater length 
 of walk, and a much greater variety of objects, 
 than is to be found in many grounds of ten 
 i mes the same extent.
 
 176" TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Beautj of the description slie now beheld 
 inspired different feelings from that of the 
 forest without. Lilla was in raptures as 
 the carriage stopped at the end of a sort 
 of lattice gallery which led to the house, 
 which was all overhung with festoons of 
 beautiful creepers, and filled with rare green- 
 house plants. She again fancied herself 
 among the charming scenes she had quitted 
 with so much reluctance ; and as she looked 
 up at the clear blue sky without a cloud, 
 upon all the deep green of the noble trees, 
 and upon the profusion of flowers which 
 adorned the place on every side, — she thought 
 herself almost restored to the lovely scenes 
 of the Levant, and felt very happy indeed. 
 
 It was with a feeling quite of relief that 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe listened to her exclamations 
 of surprise and pleasure as she descended 
 from the carriage, and followed Mrs. Selwyn 
 into the house ; stopping now to admire 
 this plant, now to stoop over and inhale the 
 sweetness of that. Craiglethorpe had been 
 accustomed to listen with impatience to these
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 177 
 
 ecstacies about what he thought so simple a 
 matter when expressed bj others, but now 
 he thought it delightful to witness her 
 content. 
 
 " Oh, dear, Mrs. Selw jn, what a paradise 
 you do live in ! How charming eyerjthing 
 
 isr 
 
 " I hope you will be able to make yourself 
 happy among us, my dear Miss Fleming,'' 
 said the lady. *' I believe this is reckoned 
 rather a sweet place. I have taken great 
 pleasure in adorning it. Poor Mr. Selwyn, 
 who, you know, has been abroad this last 
 two years, had a great taste for plants, and 
 understood them very well. I am no botanist, 
 but I dote upon flowers, and take pleasure 
 in cultivating them. I hope you love flowers 
 too, and love gardening besides." 
 
 " Flowers ! Oh, I love flowers to dis- 
 traction, but I know nothing in the world 
 about them. At Beyrout, I used to have 
 piles and piles of flowers, baskets and baskets 
 full, of sweet roses and jessamines. The 
 gardener sent them in every morning, and I 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 178 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 and Minnj used to dress out the rooms with 
 them ; but nobody thinks of gardening 
 there — nobody thinks of doing anything 
 there. It's too hot, — and then gardening 
 would spoil the hands so, I should think/^ 
 
 " Well, my dear, things are different in 
 England, you will find. Here, J^^^^ ladies 
 do a great deal. Not only by way of cul- 
 tivating their minds, which is now most care- 
 fully attended to in the school-room — but in 
 more active pursuits. T am sure, when I was 
 your age, I had never one minute unemployed. 
 My poor mother made it a rule that so it 
 should be — and I have found the advantage 
 of possessing a mind stored with ideas, and 
 a taste cultivated with sedulous care, and, 
 above all, the habit of constantly employing 
 myself. But you will like to be conducted 
 to your room. Brother, there is to-day's 
 paper, — but I dare say you have seen it. 
 Come, Miss Fleming, I will lead the way." 
 
 Miss Fleming followed good Mrs. Selwyn 
 with a demure look ; but a wicked smile was 
 lurking in the corners of her pretty mouth.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 179 
 
 She was a quick clever young thing, and. 
 she fancied she saw through Mrs. Selwjn's 
 character in three minutes. She thought her's 
 rather a stupid prosing sort of a speech, and 
 began to doubt whether she should find Mrs. 
 Selwjn as agreeable as she was well dressed ; 
 but, at all events, thought the naughty little, 
 thino^, I shall o;et some fun out of her. 
 
 So young as she was, she had yet to learn 
 how tiresome it is to live on from day to day 
 with persons who are only good to make 
 fun of. 
 
 Craiglethorpe, whose opinion of his sister 
 was much the same, and who thought her a 
 good natured, tiresome kind of woman, felt 
 half inclined to be vexed, that she should take 
 the young lady so immediately away. 
 
 It was very odd how dull and uncomfortable 
 and restless he found himself when left alone. 
 Now he yawned and walked up and down the 
 room, and then stood and considered the pic- 
 tures with which it was hung, which he had 
 never looked at before, and which he did not 
 see now ; looked out of the windows, which 
 
 N 2
 
 180 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 opened into the gaj conseryatorj, without 
 caring for a flower ; yawned again ; almost 
 wished himself in the city, and fell a wonder- 
 ing what could have induced him to come out 
 there when there would be no party. It yet 
 wanted some time to dinner, but it was non- 
 sense to think of going back. 
 
 The day was indeed advancing, and busi- 
 ness-hours were over. This was the time when 
 he usually mounted his horse and rode out, 
 after which he came home to dress for dinner, 
 in order to go and dine with some one or other 
 of his bachelor friends. For such was the 
 way in which he spent his time. 
 
 He had not the least taste for the country. 
 Ne^er could see what other people found to 
 like in it ; and very seldom came down to Mrs. 
 Selwyn's, partly because he thought his sister a 
 tiresome woman, and partly because he hated 
 quiet and green trees. 
 
 He had to amuse himself, however, upon 
 this occasion, as well as he could, for what he 
 thought an immensely long and tiresome in- 
 terval Nobody came down to him.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 181 
 
 At length the dressing-bell rang, and he, 
 a good deal out of humour, at he scarcely 
 knew what, went slowly and moodily up to 
 the room he was accustomed to occupy ; where 
 he kept changes of dress for his convenience, 
 when he came down to the Forest. 
 
 He dressed himself lazily and indifferently. 
 He was out of sorts, and was vexed, he did 
 not know why ; and his good humour was not 
 restored, for his self-complacency was certainly 
 not increased, by the figure which a long glass 
 in the room presented, as he stood before it 
 tying his neckcloth. 
 
 He had never cared one atom for his looks 
 in his life before ; never so much considered 
 his own appearance, as really to know what 
 manner of man he was ; but he did look at 
 himself now, and with an anxiety more inex- 
 plicable to himself than to us ; and, certainly 
 the conclusion he came to, that he was one of 
 the ugliest fellows that ever he had beheld, — 
 for in a mirror, no doubt, he did look very ugly 
 — did not tend to sweeten his temper, or allay 
 that sort of vague anxiety about his manner
 
 182 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 ■and appearance, which was like pins and 
 iieedles to his proud spirit. 
 
 Certainly Mr. Craiglethorpe presented an 
 aspect as little amiable as may well be con- 
 ceived, as with additional sourness in his face 
 he slowly descended the stairs, and sauntered 
 down into the drawinoj-room ao^ain. He had 
 it to himself still, but not for very long. 
 Female voices were heard in the gallery ; the 
 door opened, and the two ladies appeared. 
 
 He might at this moment have been well 
 repaid for waiting, had he been well pleased 
 enough with himself to take delight in being 
 pleased with others ; for a more lovely spec- 
 tacle could not well be seen, than this beau- 
 tiful girl presented as she came in ; dressed in 
 a manner the most becoming, though not ex- 
 actly according to the then costume of Eng- 
 land. In what the difference lay I am not 
 going to detail ; all I know is, that her fine 
 hair was confined above her temples by bands 
 of something shining and sparkling, and that 
 the rich curls fell upon the most beautiful neck 
 and shoulders in the world.
 
 TIME, THE AYE^^GER. 183 
 
 She \vas like those lovely Grecian girls 
 one lias got so well accustomed to admire, in 
 illustrations of Byron, — Haidee, the Maid of 
 Athens, &c. It may seem odd, that she should 
 have had spirits— just landed — to array herself 
 in this fanciful manner, but the truth was, 
 she was made up of imagination, very young, 
 accustomed to do nothing, and think almost 
 of nothing but of adorning herself to the best 
 advantage ; and it was quite a pleasure to her, 
 after the compulsory abstinence of a long 
 voyage, to put on her pretty clothes again. 
 She was one of those, and many such women 
 there are, — perhaps most have a little of this 
 humour, — they are none the better for being 
 without it, provided always that it is kept 
 in due bonds, — one of those women who 
 have an imaginative delicacy with regard to 
 themselves, that would lead them to be nice 
 and neat, and even adorned, to a certain de- 
 gree, though not expecting to be seen by a 
 living creature. It is a form of that disin- 
 terested love of the beautiful, which is a far 
 higher influence than that of vanity.
 
 184 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 This delicate sentiment is, I imagine, rather 
 peculiar to our women of Great Britain. A 
 French ladj, I believe, does not care how she 
 is attired, or what figure she makes, so that 
 she is not visible. Lilla had dressed finely to- 
 day, I fancy chiefly to indulge the pleasure 
 she took in feeling beautiful. You cannot 
 think how childishly busy and happy she had 
 been, unfolding some of her things, and look- 
 ing them over with her young maid, Minna. 
 She never once thought of Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 or his admiration, all that time. 
 
 When she did come in, however, with Mrs. 
 Selwyn, and saw that gentleman standing 
 there, looking rather rueful and more than 
 rather cross, though the first thought was — ' 
 *' What an ugly grumpy looking man he is after 
 all." The second, as he turned his eyes upon 
 her, and a sort of strange amazement and admi- 
 ration was visible in them became. — " Oh, he is 
 not absolutely a monster ; he may be tamed. 
 A Polypheme has been tamed before now." 
 She knew enough of songs and operas to be 
 quite sure how very amusing and interesting
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 185 
 
 it 'was for young ladies to employ themselves 
 in taming monsters. 
 
 She was, besides, beginning already to look 
 about, and wonder what she was to do with 
 herself here, and how she should pass away 
 and amuse the time ; and to tame a monster 
 seemed to her rather to promise to be enter- 
 taining. 
 
 So as soon as she saw his eyes upon her, 
 she put on such a sweet pleasant look! and 
 went and sat down by Mrs. Selwyn, casting 
 her own eyes upon the ground, so child-like 
 and innocent 1 His manners were never re- 
 markable for their amenity, but this day they 
 were more than usually abrupt and harsh. I 
 don't know how it was, the presence of this 
 beautiful young girl, seemed to annoy and put 
 him out of humour. He looked at the daz- 
 zling vision with a feeling made up of terror 
 and dissatisfaction. He began to feel un- 
 comfortable at the reflection of the part he 
 had undertaken. He expected to receive a 
 child to be forthwith despatched to school, and 
 he met this blooming young lady. He had
 
 186 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 been little accustomed to the company of 
 blooming young ladies ; he felt more and more 
 put out and awkward. — This wounded his pride 
 and vexed his temper, — he looked a very un- 
 promising monster indeed. 
 
 The naughty little thing, however, was not 
 to be so discouraged. She kept as demure, 
 still as a mouse, and would not help the con- 
 versation forward by one word. She was 
 watching him, and laughing within herself, 
 little wicked creature, at this grave and rather 
 alarming person's behaviour. At last, having 
 enjoyed this till she began to be tired, and wish 
 for a little change in the current of events, she 
 suddenly started up and began to look about, 
 
 " What can I have done with my bracelet 1 
 I declare " 
 
 " What bracelet V said he, rather grufSy ; 
 " What is it ? Have you lost anything V 
 
 " Oh, my darling — darling jewel of a brace- 
 let ! What can I have done with it ? Fm 
 certain I put it on after dressing. Oh, my 
 darling, darling little bracelet ! What shall I 
 do— what shall I do r
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 187 
 
 " What is it like '? What must one look 
 for V beginning to look about upon the floor 
 for her. 
 
 " Oh, it's the tiniest, tiniest chain jou ever 
 feaw, fastened with one little bit of a clasp not 
 bigger than a large pin's head, and containing 
 hair. Oh, I wouldn't lose it for the universe!" 
 
 " That's rather a large matter to refuse in 
 exchange for a bracelet," said he ; " but I 
 suppose it's the value of the hair." 
 
 " Ah, that's it — the hair ! and if I would 
 give millions I couldn't get a bit more, for 
 the poor head on which it grew is in the 
 grave." 
 
 " You can't mean the hair of mj poor old 
 friend, jour father," said he, looking up at her, 
 and seeming, as he felt, much shocked. 
 
 " Mj father ! Good gracious ! Mr. Craigle- 
 thorpe ; do jou think I would speak so lightlj 
 of him 1 Ah, dear " 
 
 She was quite as much shocked as he was 
 at this sudden and abrupt mention of her 
 father's name, and at the suspicion implied 
 that it was possible she could treat his memory 
 with so much le^vitj. She coloured — sat down
 
 188 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 again — looked yerj grave — and seemed to 
 have forgotten all about the bracelet. 
 
 He felt excessively annoyed at tbis little 
 scene. He never knew wbat to do with him- 
 self when present — rare occurrence — at any 
 little display of feeling. 
 
 " I beg your pardon ; I didn't mean to hurt 
 you," he said, — but it was coldly. 
 
 " Say no more about it," she answered, 
 endeavouring to suppress her emotion ; feeling 
 that this was no place to expect sympathy. 
 " Pray, say no more of it." 
 
 "But your bracelet, my dear," said Mrs. 
 Selwyn ; " you forget your bracelet — it may 
 be trampled upon and broken. You seem 
 quite to forget that you have lost your 
 bracelet." 
 
 " Did I — oh ! — never mind. Oh, it is here 
 after all, got under the other," said she, raising 
 her beautiful arm. She had known that, all 
 the time well enough, and that the hair, on 
 which she had pretended to set so much value, 
 was that of a favourite lapdog ; but the abrupt 
 mention of her father had quite destroyed the 
 zest of her little bit of mischief.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 189 
 
 "Do let me look at it. What a sweet, 
 pretty chain — and this tiny clasp with a rose 
 diamond in it! Is the hair you spoke of 
 under? And who's may it be?'' 
 
 She let Mrs, Selwyn handle and examine 
 the bracelet, but she made no answer. She 
 seemed discomposed — she could enjoy her little 
 joke no longer. The allusion to her father 
 had awakened other feelings. She could feel 
 — and deeply, as I told you, in spite of all 
 her little faults and apparent levity. Her face 
 was filled with the expression of sorrow and 
 pain. It was a face that, like a mirror, 
 reflected every feeling. 
 
 Why was she doomed to live with those who 
 could not read its characters ? 
 
 He mistook her now, as he was destined 
 for ever to mistake her. He thought she was 
 ofi'ended, when she was only endeavouring to 
 hide those feelings of regret and sorrow which 
 he had so suddenly revived. Therefore, he felt 
 inclined to be offended in his turn — his pride 
 was hurt at her manner. He thought her 
 manner of receiving his apology rude. Sweet
 
 190 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 as it in reality had been, — for slie had turned 
 her face away from them both, and had sat 
 some time silent and thoughtful. She was> 
 trying to master herself, for she felt tears 
 coming to her eyes. This was not the place, 
 too, for shedding tears. And she was eminently 
 one of those who possess a pride — a foolish 
 pride, I think it is — in not yielding to her 
 feelings before witnesses. 
 
 He ought to have understood this sort of 
 dignity of the heart, for no one possessed more 
 of it than he did. He always kept his emo- 
 tions, when emotions he had, proudly and 
 sternly to himself. But instead of sympathiz- 
 ing with her, he was hurt — his pride was hurt. 
 He had made an apology — he had made it in 
 Tain. He was not accustomed to make 
 apologies, still less to make them in vain. 
 He cared more, and felt more about this 
 than the occasion demanded ; but that was 
 the natural consequence of the power she had 
 already obtained over his feelings. A look or 
 a word from her began then to have — as it 
 long continued to have — a strange faculty of 
 exciting emotion, good or bad, in his heart.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER, 191 
 
 She, too, had somethiDg of his faults under 
 her strongly contrasted appearance and tem- 
 perament. Thej seemed created to sympa- 
 thize, and not to sympathize — to view objects 
 and events under similar aspects, and yet 
 never to understand each other's views. They 
 formed a curious history of the heart, those 
 relations, which by and by began to spring up 
 between the ward of fifteen and the guardian 
 of more than thirty.
 
 192 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 " Some friend is gone, perhaps his child's best friend, 
 A father, whose authority, in show, 
 When most severe, and mustering all its force, 
 Was but the graver countenance of love." 
 
 COWPER. 
 
 Mr. Fleming had been au old friend of 
 Mr. Oraiglethorpe's father ; and his flourishing 
 house, in the Levant trade, had been long in 
 correspondence with that of Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 senior. Mr. Fleming lived chiefly at Beyrout, 
 where he had married, and, with the exception 
 of one short visit to England, when quite a 
 little child, and which she had never seen since 
 she was three years old — there, his daughter 
 had resided. Mr. Fleming, however, had been
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 193 
 
 in England several times during this interval, 
 and but a year or two had elapsed since his 
 last visit to that country. The connection, 
 begun with the father, who had now been 
 dead several years, had thus been maintained 
 with the son. Relations of business had ri- 
 pened into a mutual esteem, and Mr. Fleming, 
 who was a sagacious observer of human nature, 
 had not failed to remark certain excellencies 
 in the character of the younger Oraiglethorpe, 
 which secured him a very high place in his 
 opinion. 
 
 His good qualities were peculiarly those 
 which excite the approbation of men. Firm- 
 ness of purpose, — steadiness of temper, — great 
 self-command, — few or no spontaneous emo- 
 tions, — no aberrations of imagination, feeling, 
 or fancy, — united to a dogged perseverance in 
 whatsoever he undertook, — and as regarded 
 money, the closest, most un deviating regard 
 to the strictest rectitude in every way. 
 
 Those who have had much to do with the 
 monied world will be aware how greatly this 
 last quality is respected, and the esteem it 
 
 YOL. I.
 
 194 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 secures ^^lien absolutely, positively, and upon 
 every occasion maintained — without the 
 slightest deviation to the right hand or to 
 the left. 
 
 The beautiful Eastern wife of Mr. Fleming 
 had died, leaving her doting husband a dis- 
 consolate and broken-hearted man. 
 
 He was one, who, though engaged in the 
 pursuit of wealth, had never to Mammon sur- 
 rendered his soul. Liberal, and full of high 
 feelings, his nobly acquired wealth had been 
 liberally dispensed. The love of the beautiful, 
 which seems to pervade the atmosphere of the 
 East, had been enkindled in the mind of the 
 Englishman ; to it, and to the indulgence of 
 his beautiful wife, much of his wealth had 
 been devoted. 
 
 Never did anything in Arabian tale much 
 exceed the beauty of Mr. Fleming's home at 
 Beyrout. The splendour of the mansion, the 
 array of fine halls opening out of each other, 
 every one finer than the last, where the walls 
 and ceilings emulated, in the richness of their 
 dyes, the colours of the sunset sky, were mag- 
 nificent beyond the ordinary magnificence of
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 195 
 
 the East. The finest paintings, the richest 
 carvings, beautiful silk from Persian looms, 
 and carpets of the most elaborate beautj, were 
 to be seen in profusion everywhere. In the 
 midst of the loveliest of these apartments, 
 a room of noble proportions, surrounded 
 with a divan, covered with cushions embroi- 
 dered in silver and gold, a fountain, clear as 
 crystal, spouted from a marble dolphin to 
 the very roof. Then poured, in streams of 
 glittering drops, like some magnificent giran- 
 dole, into the snow-white marble of the basin 
 below. Certainly, in a hot climate, this is one of 
 the most beautiful and delightful of ornaments. 
 The windows of this room were large, but 
 sheltered from the sun by the delicious shade 
 of green Venetian blinds. They reached from 
 the ceiling to the floor, and were almost 
 always wide open, leading to a fine terrace, 
 at either end of which rose stately palm trees, 
 mingled with oleanders, at one time of the 
 year one blush of rose-coloured blossoms. 
 Terrace below terrace fell from this one. Palm 
 trees, myrtles, oleanders, roses, jessamines, in 
 
 2
 
 196 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 profusion, at once delighting the eye, and 
 scenting the air ; whilst the dashing sound of 
 the innumerable fountains made a charming 
 accompaniment to the songs of the nightingales, 
 which seemed absolutely to swarm in these 
 delicious shades. A magnificent Tiew from 
 the upper terrace, extending over a rich, 
 varied landscape, and terminating in the mag- 
 nificent chain of distant mountains, completed 
 this delightful picture. 
 
 Such was the place where Lilla had sported 
 as a child, whilst her beautiful mother lay in 
 languid beauty, listlessly reposing upon her 
 rich divan. Always dressed in the Eastern 
 style. Her long caftan was of purple silk, 
 her drawers of the finest muslin, her girdle of 
 richest embroidery, and on her head, from 
 which the hair fell in the richest profusion 
 over her neck and shoulders, she wore a small 
 cap which was adorned with inestimable 
 jewels. Her arms were white as Parian 
 marble, and formed like those of some fine 
 antique gem ; as were her beautiful feet, 
 thrust into her silken slippers.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 197 
 
 This fair mother had given something of her 
 beauty, and something of her dislike to every- 
 thing like serious appHcation of mind, to her 
 daughter ; in other things they differed. The 
 child was sprightly, active, intelligent, full of 
 observation, full of feeling, and with spirits that 
 it seemed impossible to depress. She had 
 imbibed a good deal that was wholesome and 
 English, from her father — his high spirit, his 
 scorn of what was in the least base or low, and 
 his taste for magnificence and beauty. Where 
 she got her laughter-loving temper, it would 
 be hard to say ; but she possessed it in the 
 highest degree. Mischief, fun, sport, call it 
 what you will, was irresistible to her. 
 
 The beautiful indolent mother was far too 
 lansjuid to exert herself to check this exube- 
 ranee of gaiety. When the child's, or after- 
 wards the young girFs spirits, were too much 
 for her, she would consign her to her attend- 
 ants, and send her into the garden, where this 
 little sportive thing would amuse herself by 
 chasing her nurse, or Minny, her nurse's 
 daughter, a year or two older than she was,
 
 198 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 about ; or else by romping with her little 
 dog, who was as young, as wilful, and as mis- 
 chievous as herself ; whilst the mother lay still, 
 listened to the bursts of laughter, and was con- 
 tent, so that the child was happy, and she not 
 disturbed. 
 
 As for Mr. Fleming, anything in the form 
 of rebuke or restraint was still less likely to 
 come from him. Next to his wife, he doted 
 upon this lovely child ; he thought her a per- 
 fect angel, a paragon of beauty and intelligence. 
 Her laughter was the sunbeam to his soul. 
 Her gaiety the exhilarating wine of life to him. 
 Her mischievous pranks made him laugh; her 
 winning, loving, affectionate ways, adore. 
 
 Thus she fluttered life away, in one gay 
 vision of delight, till the day when the beau- 
 tiful mother died. A cloud fell over the house 
 from that time. Mr. Fleming had loved not 
 wisely, but too well. His devotion to this 
 beautiful woman exceeds description. When 
 she died his life suddenly darkened. 
 
 The relish seemed to be lost for everything. 
 Even for things that might seem little con-
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 199 
 
 nected with her image. And not only was he 
 depriyed of his dearest treasure, but with it 
 every other possession suddenly lost its value, 
 every other satisftiction its zest. 
 
 Even his daughter, then just bursting into 
 bloom ; only just turned fourteen years, it is 
 true, but early as it was, having attained all 
 the first beauty of youth, and no longer a 
 child, — even his daughter, at that interesting 
 age, seemed to have lost her power to occupy 
 and excite his mind. 
 
 He shunned rather than sought the presence 
 of one who reminded him of her he had lost. 
 And his afikirs in which he had taken such 
 intense interest, as the means of surrounding 
 this object of his passionate attachment with 
 every luxury which the most lavish expense 
 could procure, seemed no longer to excite his 
 attention. Wealth was no longer of value, it 
 had lost its power to gratify his heart. 
 
 The young girl was not, however, suffered to 
 languish and pine away, as she must inevitably 
 have done, under this dark shadow of a per- 
 manent grief. She was consigned to the care
 
 200 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 of Tarious friends, to share in the amusements 
 natural to her age, and as, is natural to her 
 age, she soon, to a degree, recovered her 
 spirits. But she loved her father dearlj, and 
 she understood and sympathized tenderly in his 
 sufferings, in spite of the pains he took to con- 
 ceal them from her. 
 
 Nothing could exceed the gentle, affectionate 
 sweetness of her attentions to him. But as 
 he insisted that this sliould in nowise prevent 
 her sharing the amusements of her friends, 
 neither did it prevent her receiving a vast deal 
 of flattery, indulging an incipient love of 
 coquetry, and enjoying much more freedom 
 than was good for her. 
 
 The father knew that his death-blow had 
 been given him. There were feelings about 
 the heart which rarely deceive. 
 
 There are sudden and there are slow 
 deaths, by that process called breaking of the 
 heart, as there are slow declines and galloping 
 consumptions. Mr. Fleming did not feel the 
 less sure he should not recover the blow he 
 had received, because it was some time before
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 201 
 
 he finally sank under it ; and he anxiously 
 ruminated upon what he should do with his 
 daughter. 
 
 Much as she had lately mingled with the 
 society at Beyrout, and much as she had been 
 followed and admired, no one had presented 
 themselves in the light of a suitor whom 
 he could at all regard as desirable. It was 
 evident, quite evident, no one had succeeded, 
 in the least degree, in touching her heart. 
 She was very playful, rather wilful, fond of 
 admiration, gay and easy with most, but 
 nothing more. The heart was unwounded; 
 not that it was formed of insensible stuff, far 
 from that, but because there was no one 
 worthy to excite its sensibility. 
 
 To leave her at Beyrout without her being 
 married was what the father could not bear 
 the thoughts of His old English prejudices, 
 — those wholesome prejudices which cling 
 close to the true Englishman's heart, be his 
 abode where it may, — made him desire to 
 return to his own country with his daughter 
 before he died.
 
 202 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 He began to make preparations for his 
 departure, and again to attend to, in order 
 to wind up his affairs — affairs which, in the 
 depression of his spirits, he had too long 
 neglected. But indifferent, as he thought 
 himself, to wealth, the shock he sustained was 
 terrible when he discoyered the state in which 
 thej were. JSTo man, be his riches what thej 
 may, can, with impunity, spend without 
 limitation, in the way Mr. Fleming had done. 
 He thought he had possessed means to cover 
 any expense which, in a mere private family, 
 could be possible. Here he had deceived him- 
 self, — but he had done worse. In the indul- 
 gence of a romantic grief, — romantic, for it was 
 ill justified by the value of the creature whom 
 he had lost — his affairs had been left in the 
 hands of inferiors. Advantage had been 
 taken of his negligence and abstraction ; and, 
 in short, when Mr. Fleming came to take an 
 exact account of what he really possessed, he 
 discovered to his dismay that, far from being 
 able to continue his present expensive style 
 of living, his plan of life must be reduced to
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 203 
 
 a Yeiy moderate scale, and his daughter, whom 
 he had been in the habit of looking upon 
 as heiress to almost inexhaustible wealth, 
 must content herself with a moderate, and, 
 what we should call in this country, a gentle- 
 woman's fortune. 
 
 She behaved very well when this was 
 hinted, rather than announced to her. The 
 gaj carelessness of her temper helped her in 
 some degree, for she scarcely troubled herself 
 to cast a thought upon the consequences of 
 the present state of affairs ; but she possessed, 
 in truth, a noble, generous, disinterested heart, 
 full of love and free from selfishness, and she 
 cared little for any matter not connected with 
 her tenderer feelings. She never lost a shade 
 of colour upon hearing that her father was 
 no longer rich, — her spirits were light as ever. 
 The only change that could be perceived in 
 her conduct was a much more sedulous and 
 unbroken attention to his comfort in every- 
 thing. 
 
 He wanted such comfort, poor man. The 
 ruin of his fortune completed what the devas-
 
 204 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 tat ion of his affections liad begun. Mr. 
 Fleming began to sink rapidly. 
 
 It was soon evident that he Tvould not 
 live to take his^ daughter himself to England. 
 All he could do was to cast about for some 
 one under whose guardianship to place her, 
 when she should arrive there, and his thoughts 
 turned to Mr. Oraiglethorpe. I have told jou 
 that he knew him well, and esteemed him 
 much ; his age seemed to be suitable for the 
 undertaking, and he possessed the advantage 
 of having a married sister in a very respect- 
 able position of life, and a nice ladj-like 
 sort of a person, with whom Lilla might 
 safely reside. Mr. Fleming wrote to Oraigle- 
 thorpe upon the subject, begging of him to 
 take upon himself the care of his daughter 
 till such time as she should be of age ; 
 informed him of the change in his cii'cum- 
 stances, and that all the fortune Lilla might 
 expect would not amount to more than fifteen 
 thousand pounds. 
 
 Oraiglethorpe accepted the charge; thinking, 
 I believe, a good deal more of the investment
 
 205 
 
 of the young lady's money to the best advan- 
 tage than of any other care connected with 
 her. Shortly after this Mr. Fleming died. 
 And no^Y I have explained why the fair Lilla 
 was coming up the river in that ship from the 
 Levant, upon that lovely summer evening 
 which witnessed the first introduction of the 
 sruardian to the ward. 
 
 Miss Fleming had not seen many English- 
 men at Beyrout. The acquaintance she there 
 met with might be called a sort of mixture 
 of all nations ; and in this society the dif- 
 ferent peculiarities of each nation were very 
 much lost, and a sort of mongrel race of men 
 was produced, — which, as regards character, 
 manner, and style of sentiment is, I think, 
 seldom found to be to the advantage of 
 any. 
 
 An individual well imbued with the cha- 
 racteristics proper to his own land, profits, 
 I think it is agreed upon all hands, to a
 
 206 
 
 very liigh degree by travel ; by becoming 
 acquainted with new forms of society, new 
 modes of thought, new habits, manners, and 
 customs. He enlarges his mind without 
 obliterating the landmarks, as one may call 
 them, of his own particular country ; and 
 becomes, in some sort, a citizen of the world, 
 without losing his individuality as a member 
 of one community. 
 
 But where men from different parts of the 
 world are congregated together in one spot, — 
 not as travellers, not as passing observers, but 
 as residents, — the result seems to be, upon 
 the whole, unsatisfactory. As the lingua 
 franca is the most corrupt of dialects, so, in 
 this mixture of men of all denominations, the 
 purest motives for honourable action, those 
 which belong to the ties which connect men 
 with their own country, are in danger of being 
 lost. Instead of enlarging their ideas by a 
 correction of their prejudices, men are apt 
 to weaken the sanctions of right by shaking 
 their principles both in morals and religion, 
 through the harsh contrasts of opinion to which
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 207 
 
 the J are daily and hourly exposed. Where 
 everything a man has been accustomed from 
 childhood to reverence, may prove to be 
 exactly the mark for ridicule of those with 
 whom he is in daily companionship, there is 
 danger of his losing his faith in all his per- 
 suasions, even the most sacred ; and under 
 such a process he is almost certain speedily 
 to corrupt and degrade. 
 
 So it had been at Beyrout. The Greek, 
 the Frenchman, the German, the Italian, and 
 the Briton, were all mingled together ; and 
 except her father, Lilla had not met, perhaps, 
 with one man bearing the character of the 
 true Englishman. Those she had been ac- 
 quainted with were Englishmen no longer in 
 anything but the name. 
 
 Now there is something in the character of 
 Englishmen, I believe, peculiarly attractive to 
 women of a high tone of feehng. There is 
 that in his inartificial, his unwilling devotion 
 to the softer sex — something in the manly 
 earnestness with which he engages in the 
 serious pursuits of life, which elevates him in
 
 208 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 her eyes ; and whilst it reduces her to that 
 second place, in which she is most happy and 
 — let satirists say what they will — most con- 
 tent to dwell, it adds immensely to the interest 
 and pride of conquest, when beings so refrac- 
 tory are reduced to subjection. 
 
 Most Englishmen have something of the 
 Hypolite in them. Most women own the power 
 of such a character over the imagination. 
 AVhether the Old Man is right or wrong in this 
 notion of his with regard to women in general, 
 as regarded Lilla Fleming it certainly was 
 most especially true. 
 
 The trifling, empty, and considerably de- 
 generated young Englishmen, whom she had 
 met with in the summer parties at Beyrout, 
 ready enough as they had one and all shown 
 themselves to fall down and worship her 
 beauty, had failed to make any impression upon 
 her heart. They had taught her to under- 
 stand her power, and they had tempted her to 
 make herself amusement by its exercise, for 
 their levity seemed to excuse her coquetry. 
 A little scorching of the wings was the worst
 
 209 
 
 that could happen any of the parties by thus 
 playing a little with fire. Nothing had ever 
 arisen in her communications with society, 
 to create painful feelings, give occasion for 
 serious thought, or create the least conscien- 
 tious scruple. 
 
 As far as she herself was concerned, she had 
 remained, as I told you, perfectly indifi'erent. 
 She looked up to her father — she loved her 
 father; she possessed the priceless treasure 
 — a fine, moral taste as regarded character 
 — she had formed it upon him. 
 
 This comparison with her father it was, in- 
 deed, which had saved her from being dazzled 
 by the false brilliancy of others. In short, Lilla 
 left the dangerous precincts of the east with a 
 heart altogether her own, and which had never 
 been touched, or even interested in the slight- 
 est degree. She was still searching for her 
 ideal — as most girls of her age are — and her 
 ideal possessed the leading features of her 
 father's character. 
 
 This brief account of the condition of her 
 mind is necessary to explain what took place. 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 A strange sort of interest was awakened by 
 Mr. Craigletliorpe in Lilla's imagination from the 
 moment that she first beheld him. There was 
 a something in his decisive, almost arbitrary 
 ways, which seemed strangely agreeable to her 
 taste. She was sick of flattery. Truth, how- 
 ever harsh, was delightful — it might be only 
 because it was new. 
 
 It might be, that however harsh the manner 
 in which it was conveyed, it was mingled with 
 a something difficult to describe, which gave a 
 strange sort of sweetness to this harshness. 
 
 There was a something in the eye of that man 
 ■ — that apparently severe, inflexible man — a 
 something now and then — rarely to be seen 
 there certainly, but which was assuredly there 
 to be discerned at times ; which, to discern, 
 awakened an almost wild feeling of triumph 
 and delight in Miss Fleming. 
 
 So cold — so almost repulsive in his manner 
 — so easily offended as he was at any of her 
 playful extravagances — so easily put out of 
 temper by her little practical jokes — so dis- 
 pleased with her carelessness as regarded her
 
 211 
 
 expenses — so cruelly without indulgence for 
 her many, many follies, not to say faults, 
 — there was that at times in his face, which 
 assured the lively, but not undiscerning crea- 
 ture, that hide it as he would, Mr. Craigle- 
 thorpe did care for her ; and, that if she could 
 not win his approbation by her behaviour, she 
 could at least show her power by giving him 
 pain. 
 
 And pain in such a way, it was ever her 
 highest amusement to give. 
 
 She was quick as light in discovering the 
 weak side of any character with which she had 
 to do ; and she soon discovered the weak side 
 of his — discovered it with a feeling of wicked, 
 exulting triumph — the naughty little thing 
 that she was. 
 
 This man of so much coldness and insen- 
 sibility in his demeanour — apparently so indif- 
 ferent to the opinion of all around him, she 
 soon discovered to be the victim of the most 
 sensitive and inordinate pride. 
 
 Pride under which the angels fell — how 
 shall it not precipitate man 1 
 
 p2
 
 212 TIME, THE ATENGER. 
 
 Through our faults we are Yuhierable. The 
 strongest characters are assailable there. This 
 joung tiling — her faculties sharpened bj the 
 interest she began to take in the subject 
 — speedily discoYcred the ^Yeak point of 
 this strong character — its inordinate pride. 
 Through that she felt him to be assailable, 
 if not through his heart. She could plague, if 
 she could not charm him to submission. 
 
 It might be that she possessed some power 
 OYer his tenderer feelings, if tender feelings he 
 had ; but she perceiYed that she had to do 
 with one, who would ncYer submit to be the 
 slave of any woman however dear — who would 
 break his own heart rather than be in captivity 
 to it. Her softness could not deprive him of 
 the mastery over himself — but her tormenting 
 might. 
 
 She could tease him — she could provoke 
 him — she could irritate his temper — she could 
 exhaust his patience— she could have the dear 
 delight of exciting him to sudden paroxysms 
 of anger — of provoking him to use intemperate
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 213 
 
 expressions, — a childishness of which he was 
 immediately ashamed. 
 
 She had the triumph of witnessing that 
 shame. 
 
 The delight to see Mr. Craiglethorpe pro- 
 voked, and by her, beyond his power of self- 
 control, and heartily ashamed of his weakness. 
 
 The giant subdued, as it were, by his own 
 strength. 
 
 But there was another conscious weakness 
 about Mr. Craiglethorpe upon which he was far 
 more susceptible — of which he was intensely 
 ashamed, and yet which it was impossible for 
 him to Yanquish. It had grown upon him he 
 knew not how. Ever since Lilla's arrival in 
 England, this folly — this unmanly weakness, 
 as he felt it to be, had been gradually gaining 
 ground. 
 
 He could have killed himself for yielding to 
 it ; yet yield to it he could not help doing. 
 He would have been ready to have killed any 
 one else whom he suspected of having in the 
 slightest degree detected in him this new 
 infirmity.
 
 214 
 
 But women possess an art of divination into 
 the characters of those thej care for ; and 
 Lilla, to her inexpressible delight, was speedily 
 mistress of this little secret. 
 
 She discovered that this Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 who professed such a cynical contempt for 
 dress and appearance, and all the conven- 
 tional graces of society, had become all of a 
 sudden most sensitively alive to the subject as 
 regarded himself, and ridiculously anxious 
 about the propriety of his dress and appear- 
 ance. 
 
 Oh, how the cruel one revelled in this dis- 
 covery ! 
 
 What thousands of pretty, malicious inven- 
 tions were set on foot for turning it to account 
 and annoying this dry, severe guardian of hers 
 in a new way. Little, midge-like stings they 
 were, but they assailed him where most vul- 
 nerable, and where he could least bear to be 
 attacked ; and inflicted a torment, his pride 
 would have suffered him rather to die than 
 oonfess. 
 And all this time she was herself littla
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 215 
 
 aware of the true cause whence this weakness 
 had sprung ; for she had scarcely known him 
 before the secret cause of this unaccustomed 
 weakness had begun to take effect. 
 
 She was little aware how entirely this sus- 
 ceptibility to appearance, which she thought 
 so ridiculous and incongruous in this man, and 
 this anxiety about dress which formed such a 
 laughable contradiction to the rest of his cha- 
 racter, arose from the monster contradiction of 
 all — when the Yotary of Mammon became the 
 victim of Love ; and the man for thirty years a 
 stranger to such follies, the slave of a pretty, 
 wilful girl. 
 
 Never captive lion in fable bore his fetters 
 with more impatience than did Mr. Oraigle- 
 thorpe. He fretted — he could almost be said 
 to rage — under the force of fascinations which 
 he found it impossible to resist. The charm- 
 ing whims of the sweet, thoughtless girl 
 exerted a strange feeling of revolt, of anger, in 
 his mind. He never asked himself how it 
 went with him; his pride would never have 
 allowed him to confess to himself that he
 
 216 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 could have become tlie victim of a weakness 
 he had all his life treated with the most un- 
 mitigated contempt and derision. 
 
 To find himself thus entangled, thus in the 
 power of one almost a child — his serenity at 
 her mercy, his feelings the sport of her fan- 
 ciful caprices — drove him at times almost 
 literally mad with vexation. Under the in- 
 fluence of his internal resolves and contradic- 
 tions, his manner became harsher and harsher, 
 his manner colder and less unbending, his 
 humour more irritable, than it had ever been 
 known to be before. He seemed to take 
 refuge in this roughness against the effects of 
 his sensibility. 
 
 Angry with himself, he never left his sister's 
 house, without vowing he would not come there 
 again; yet, attracted there by a power too 
 strong to be resisted, every -day found him 
 there again for the last time. 
 
 He never once, during the whole course of 
 their intimacy, endeavoured to propitiate her 
 by any of those little, tender flatteries, any 
 of those little love-ofibrings, which men take
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 217 
 
 such pleasure to make, and women to 
 receire. 
 
 A deep, proud sense of Lis inferiority in 
 personal attractions, united to an equally 
 deep, proud sense of his worth in other 
 j-espects, perhaps it was, that made him detest 
 the idea of gaining favour by sucli ways. It 
 was as himself and for himself alone that he 
 would seek to be yalued, and as such, he 
 believed he must seek it in vain. 
 
 Certainly, never idol enjoyed less of the 
 sweet incense of the heart's idolatry than did 
 this beautiful girl. On the contrary, she found 
 it difficult to obtain any little indulgence from 
 him. Far from having any influence with him, 
 it seemed as if it were particularly the reverse. 
 Because she desired, he seemed to love to 
 refuse ; where other men would have been so 
 happy to grant any little favour or privilege, 
 he seemed actually pleased to be able to 
 deny. 
 
 He took a strange, cruel pleasure in seeing 
 the tears of vexation and disappointment in 
 those eyes, from which, in any other way, he
 
 218 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 felt they never could be shed for him — those 
 eyes, whose beautiful, joyous brightness haunted 
 him in his dreams ! It seemed to be a sullen 
 satisfaction to render them cloudy as his 
 own.
 
 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 219 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 " Formed in the prodigality of nature, 
 Endearing, flattering, gay, and wild." 
 
 LiDYARD. 
 
 " Now, do you know, Mr. Oraiglethorpe,^^ — 
 thus Lilla began one day, — " where Mrs. Sel- 
 wjn and I are going on Thursday, May the 
 16thr 
 
 He had come down to the Forest, as he did 
 now almost every day, to dine at his sister's. 
 He had quite forsaken his bachelor parties. 
 When his friends laughed at him, he said he 
 was not well ; that the late hours, the turtle, 
 and the wine did not suit him, or made some 
 excuse of that sort; and if questioned farther
 
 220 TIME, THE AYENGEK. 
 
 upon tlie subject, showed so much impatience, 
 that the matter was not pushed farther. 
 
 He was a man none of his friends cared to 
 annoj. 
 
 He had come down this day more out of 
 sorts than ever. Lilla had been excessively 
 teasing and provoking the evening before. 
 Somehow she had managed to break through 
 his guard, in a way he could not prevent, and 
 yet could not endure. Men, fenced in as it 
 were, by the coldness and reserve of their own 
 manner, feel quite at a loss, quite in a false 
 position when some rash and daring spirit 
 ventures to break through the enchanted 
 circle. 
 
 Curious sometimes it is to watch absolute 
 stupidity and positive want of observation 
 blundering into this sort of familiarity with 
 great spirits, accustomed to the reverence and 
 distant observance of all around them. It is 
 laughable to observe how the fool, " rushing in 
 where the angels fear to tread," absolutely 
 baffles the great spirit by the very dulness of 
 his perception ; and how the superior one
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 221 
 
 finding no arms in his possession to free him- 
 self against such intrusion, patiently submits, 
 with a sort of awkward resignation, to the 
 impertinent familiarity of the person he can 
 scarcely endure. 
 
 But when childish innocence, as may be seen 
 in some sweet little children, or beauty in all 
 its loveliness and sense of sweet authority, 
 dares thus to intrude within the barrier, few 
 things are more delightful to contemplate, than 
 the pleasure with which the stern spirit, whose 
 high qualities have kept others awe-struck and 
 at a distance, welcomes the dear intruder to 
 his bosom ; and lodges it there as the most 
 precious of treasures ; yea, within his heart of 
 hearts. 
 
 Oraiglethorpe's spirit was lofty, but not, it 
 seems, genial enough for so generous a feeling. 
 And yet, perhaps, I wrong him ; had he ; could 
 he have divined, that the least grain of parti- 
 ality, — that it was the love of being occupied 
 about him which had led the too dear imper- 
 tinent so far, it might have come to pass with 
 him as it has done with greater hearts. But
 
 222 TIME, THE AVEKGER. 
 
 this he did not guess ; the idea never crossed 
 his mind. It was his proud and bitter self- 
 distrust, this war between his love and his 
 pride, which made his manner so variable, and 
 his feelings so unkind. 
 
 "Now do jou know, Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 where Mrs. Selwjn and I are going upon 
 Thursday the 16th 1" she said, going up to 
 him as he came into the dining-room. 
 
 He was dressed for dinner. His habits in 
 these matters had changed, as I told jou, ever 
 since the evening he had walked the deck of 
 that steamer in the Thames, just arrived from 
 Bejrout. The simplicity of dress to which he 
 was accustomed, and which became him so 
 well, had been exchanged to one far less 
 becoming, even in those very eyes for which, 
 alone, it had been assumed. 
 
 She could not bear his fine waistcoats. 
 She thought, and she thought rightly, 
 that such were quite out of character with 
 him ; besides being in themselves decidedly 
 vulgar. 
 
 He was in a peculiarly grand aflPair of this sort
 
 TBIE, THE AYENGER. 223 
 
 to-daj. She guessed why it might haye been 
 put on, thought it looked horribly bad, — 
 laughed in secret at the idea of the transfor- 
 mation ; and oh, woman ! — woman ! — but they 
 will do it — felt a little shade of contempt for 
 the very weakness, which was the effect of her 
 own charms. 
 
 It was a lovely evening, — the glass doors at 
 the end of the room were open to the verandah, 
 which was quite full of roses, and jessamines, 
 and myrtles in full scent and flower. Birds in 
 their golden cages were singing among them, 
 little joyous musical captives. The muslin and 
 silk curtains were swinging softly up and down, 
 the sinking sun lighting up the picture-frames 
 and gay furniture of all sorts with which the 
 room w^as filled. Nothing could be more lively 
 than the pleasant scene, where he, like some 
 dark shadow in one corner of a picture, stood, 
 his sallow complexion, and withered face, and 
 thin figure looking more sallow, withered, and 
 thin, than ever. The only point in which he 
 harmonized with the gay perspective around
 
 224 TIME, THE AYEKGEE. 
 
 him, being tlie identical waistcoat aboYC- 
 mentioned. 
 
 She, on the contrary, was of all these lights, 
 and flowers, and colours, and wavy forms, the 
 lightest, most graceful, and most gay. She 
 had on that day a delicate pink silk dress, 
 with a vast deal of fine white lace about it, and 
 her beautiful hair, more glossy than the finest 
 silk, the sole ornament of her head, was done up 
 in a profusion of soft braids, plaits, and ringlets. 
 She came up with that sweet consciousness of 
 her charms, which makes a woman happy. 
 She could not help haying seen herself in her 
 glass, you know — and she had held out her 
 hand, a beautiful hand it was, and the arm 
 which was all clustered over with rich bracelets ; 
 with a " How do you do, Mr. Craiglethorpe,'' 
 as she entered. 
 
 He had not taken the offered hand ; but 
 gazing at her from head to foot, had only 
 answered in a somewhat vexed manner: — 
 
 "Going out again at night, as usual, I 
 see."
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 225 
 
 " To be sure, — what would you have us do 
 at home 1 Nay/' she went on, sitting down 
 by him, " it's as good a time as any to talk 
 about it. Now do you know, Mr. Craiglethorpe, 
 where Mrs. Selwyn and I are going on Thurs- 
 day, May the 16th r' 
 
 " No, how should I 1 and why this distinc- 
 tion about Thursday, May the 16th, of all 
 Thursdays 1 Every day in your calendar seems 
 to me alike. You spend them all in this eter- 
 nal going out, I think.'' 
 
 " Yes, to be sure we do. It's in vain to 
 scold about that. Moping at home is what, 
 luckily for me, Mrs. Selwyn likes as little as I 
 do, and indeed, I should not have presumed," 
 in a mocking tone, " to trouble you with a 
 mention of our frivolous engagements, but that 
 on this said Thursday, the i6th, there happens 
 to be a fancy ball, and I shall want more money 
 for my dress." 
 
 '' Money ! You had money not a fortnight 
 ago. What is become of it all ? Where is it 
 all goner' 
 
 " A question not to be asked as to the where, 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 for it is one I hold myself excused from answer- 
 ing ; but as to the what, it is spent, that's 
 all." 
 
 "Very well, — when quarter-day comes again, 
 you will have some more." 
 
 " Quarter-day !" contemptuously ; " what is 
 quarter-day ?" 
 
 " According to most people, the day that 
 marks the beginning of a new quarter of a 
 year, I believe,^' said he ; " just ten weeks and 
 two days from this present hour." 
 
 " Nonsense," she said, rather pettishly. 
 *' You don't mean to say, Mr. Oraiglethorpe, 
 that I am to go without money till then," and 
 she laughed somewhat scornfully. "What 
 notions some people do get ! As if one could 
 possibly do without money till quarter-day, if 
 quarter-day is so far off. — As if people's lives 
 were to be regulated by quarter-day. Quarter- 
 day ! As if one didn't want money at sortie 
 times, and did want it at other times. Quarter- 
 day ! As if tastes, feelings, wants, and wishes, 
 were to be regulated by quarter-day !" 
 
 " I have been used to regulate them some-
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER.' 227 
 
 thing in that despised fashion, as far, at least, 
 as money is concerned,'' lie said. 
 
 She ran on : — " Quarter-day ! So, if a poor 
 wretch is starving for want of a mouthful of 
 bread, I am to tell him, — Dear me ! I can't 
 give you anything yet, — but be sure you shall 
 have something on quarter-day, — that is, if 
 you are not dead of hunger before — Ten 
 weeks, two days hence, at quarter-day, you 
 shall have a bit of bread. So, if one wants 
 to go to a charming pic-nic party, one must 
 not take advantage of this bright, fine weather, 
 — oh, dear, no, — but wait ten weeks, two days, 
 till it even rains or snows — till it's quarter-day ! 
 To be sure. Lest nobody should have any 
 money to buy bonnets or cold lamb. Quarter- 
 day ! Well, of all the chains people are so 
 perversely fond of weaving for themselves, com- 
 mend me, for its absurdity, to quarter-day ! 
 Quarter-day ! Ridiculous !" 
 
 He looked at her. There was a sparkling 
 sarcasm, a contemptuous defiance in her eye, 
 which he could noc bear. He felt as if the 
 triumphant derision which he saw written 
 
 Q2
 
 228 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 there degraded him in his own esteem. Such, 
 at least, was the sudden feeling of the first 
 moment, the next was more worthy of him. 
 
 " You may despise such considerations," he 
 said, " but the wise respect them." 
 
 " Wisdom is an affair of longitudes," she 
 answered, carelessly, "and your longitudes 
 are not mine. No doubt there are regions 
 where quarter-day is the pole on which exist- 
 ence turns. However, I don't want to make 
 you cross, for one gets nothing by that, I 
 know of old ; so pray let us have done dis- 
 puting .... only, pray, Mr. Craiglethorpe, let 
 me have some money, for the short and the long 
 of it is, some money I must and will have." 
 
 " No," he said, sturdily, " you have already 
 had more money than you ought." 
 
 " And who, pray, is to be the judge of that 
 ought, I beg to know 1" 
 
 " I am." 
 
 " You are !" glancing slyly at his fine waist- 
 coat ; " oh, then I am safe, if you measure 
 my own love of a little finery and extrava- 
 gance by that of certain "
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 229 
 
 *' What do you mean V he said, roughly. 
 
 " Oh, nothing, — nothing at all. Only I am 
 sure Mr. Craiglethorpe must be the last person 
 in the world to deny the means of indulging 
 a little taste for extravagance in dress .... 
 of which he is himself so graceful an example." 
 
 " I don't understand you,'' said he, as a 
 faint colour of mingled consciousness and anger 
 passed over his cheek, only to be succeeded by 
 an increased paleness. Mr. Craiglethorpe was 
 one who turned white when he was angry. 
 " All I mean to say is, that every one must 
 limit their expenses to their fortune, unless 
 they mean to be ruined. I have the care of 
 your fortune, and I shall limit yours." 
 
 " Those who gave you the power never 
 limited them." 
 
 " Perhaps if they had, it might have been 
 better for all parties." 
 
 " What do you mean by that insinuation, 
 sir V she cried, her eyes flashing. " Do you 
 mean to cast an aspersion upon the memory 
 of my generous father." 
 
 He was silent.
 
 230 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 " Do jou mean, — do you dare to intend to 
 mean V tears of passion starting to her eyes, 
 — " to cast an aspersion upon the father's 
 memory; and before his daughter, too/' 
 
 " I am not casting aspersions, as you call 
 them. You said you were not accustomed to 
 limit your expenses in former days ; and all I 
 meant to say was, that if you had been so, 
 you might, perhaps, hare been less called 
 upon to limit them now.'' 
 
 The recollection of her father — -of that day 
 when he had told her he was ruined and had 
 ruined her ; of the bitter tears of compunction 
 and self-reproach that he had shed — of all his 
 tenderness, all his fond indulgence, rose to the 
 child's memory. She could not and would 
 not bear to have the most distantly implied 
 reproach cast upon him, upon account of that 
 for wliich he had so bitterly reproached him- 
 self. 
 
 She began to cry bitterly, and in the 
 passion of her grief and recollections, called 
 Mr. Craiglethorpe barbarous and cruel. He 
 thought her — but he was not quite harsh
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 231 
 
 enough to say so, — unreasonable, unjust, and 
 weak. 
 
 He could not sympathise with the daugh- 
 ter's impetuous love for her father — her ardent 
 and indignant defence of his memory — he 
 only thought of the injustice done to him- 
 self, and his own motives of action by this 
 outburst of feeling. Besides, he hated all 
 outbursts of feeling; nothing made him feel so 
 awkward and at a loss. 
 
 But more than this, he committed that 
 blasphemy against the heart, to dare allow 
 himself in the thought that all these tears 
 were probably more upon account of her 
 present vexation, than of her pious recollec- 
 tions. A barbarous injustice — a want of all 
 perception, of all sympathy of character ! It 
 was not the first nor the last he committed by 
 many and many. 
 
 Under the influence of these suspicions, 
 therefore, he sat by apparently unmoved till 
 she had done crying, and she soon had done — 
 she checked the flow of feelinoj — she felt
 
 232 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 ashamed to waste tears so sacred upon one so 
 insensible to every tender affection. 
 
 Her grief changed to irritation and anger 
 as she dried her eyes with her handkerchief 
 and returned to the assault in quite a different 
 style. 
 
 '' I know well enough, by experience," she 
 said, "' Avhat may be expected from Mr. Oraigle- 
 thorpe's good nature; you seem to hate to 
 oblige anybody, more especially me. You 
 take, I know you do, a positive pleasure in 
 vexing and denying me — you have not the 
 least grain of kindness in the world for the 
 poor young girl thrown into your power; and 
 you like, I know you do, to make her life as 
 miserable as you possibly can. You never 
 look happy yourself, and you hate others to 
 be happy — you hate me to be happy, I see 
 you do. WeU, if that's your pleasure, be 
 content, I am unhappy enough — there's no- 
 thing, I should think, in this house, to make a 
 girl like me so very happy, that need envy 
 me, though you may not be much better off 
 yourself, in the midst of your money bags and
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 233 
 
 fine clothes. . . So I shall not — I was going 
 to do it, but I won't — no, I will never ask jou 
 again for the least favour in the world. You 
 deny me this, it shall be the last — I don't 
 want to hate jou, I'm sure I don't, but you 
 force one to it, you do " 
 
 "No need of much force,^' he remarked, 
 gloomily. 
 
 " I know you don't care for me or my hap- 
 piness, the least atom in the world," again hurt 
 and excited she went on: "I've proved that, 
 over and over again, but I did not think you 
 would be so mean as to deny me a paltry sum 
 of money, when I asked it. Oh ! or I would 
 have died rather than have asked it." 
 
 He wanted to think that her passion deformed 
 her countenance; that her sullenness or her 
 violence destroyed all her charms. Perverse 
 mortal — he loved her better thus, better than 
 in all her laughter-loving humours. There 
 was a sort of congeniality then with his own 
 nature. 
 
 But he was not to be moved from his reso- 
 lution — he was hard as a rock. It was
 
 234 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 strange, but he had not felt one relenting 
 wish, one desire to soothe or indulge her. He 
 was offended with her violence, not sorry for 
 her disappointment — he had a secret satis- 
 faction even in the feeling that her wishes 
 ought not, and should not be indulged. 
 
 " I think, considering how much jou despise 
 me for mj prudent attention to money con- 
 cerns, you show a very strange value for it by 
 indulging this ill-humour, because you cannot 
 get it when you want it. It's well for those 
 who are so fond of spending, that there are 
 others in the world who like sparing. It may 
 be a very unamiable trait of character, I own, 
 but it strikes me as not more selfish or greedy 
 than that which is for ever grasping at what 
 others have obtained, — to spend upon the most 
 frivolous forms of personal enjoyment."' 
 
 " What I ask for is my own, not yours, 
 Mr. Oraiglethorpe." 
 
 " Right— when due, and not till then," he 
 replied. 
 
 " Oh, I understand — yes, yes. I have lived 
 near a counting-house long enough to com
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 235 
 
 prehend joii at last. Advances ! I ^yas asking 
 jou, it seems, for advances. Indeed, people in 
 trade never risk making advances. Oh, no! 
 let people perish, heart-broken, rather than 
 make them advances : and whj should the rule 
 be broken now, to indulge me ? What folly ! Oh, 
 I beg jour pardon, Mr. Oraigiethorpe ; I under- 
 stand now. Stupid thing ! not to see it 
 before. It would have been necessary that 
 you should have made an advance of forty 
 pounds or so. I crave your pardon for being 
 angry ; I thought it was my purse you were 
 sparing, not your own." 
 
 He made a sudden gesture, as if he could 
 have stopped her mouth with a blow — he felt 
 as if he could have killed her. 
 
 The taunt was too bitter. 
 
 He felt too angry to speak. 
 
 Conscious as he was of the anxiety with 
 which, aware of her expensive habits, he had 
 devoted himself to securing, and, if possible, 
 improving her moderate fortune, upon the one 
 hand, and correcting these increasing habits 
 of extravagance, upon the other — conscious of
 
 236 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 the purity and disinterestedness of his mo- 
 tives ; he felt the injustice of her last words 
 with a bitterness that seemed to alter the 
 whole temper of his mind. 
 
 She was wrong, certainly very wrong — but 
 had he nothing upon his side to be forgiven 1 
 Were there no allowances to be made for a 
 young creature, thus for the first time opposed 
 so roughly and so harshly in her desires — she 
 who had been so accustomed to be indulged 
 in every way; spoiled for so many years. 
 He thought her unreasonable, wrong, and 
 unjust — so she was. But what he was angry 
 with himself for, was, that he could not help 
 thinking her more irresistibly charming than 
 ever. 
 
 There was something right in Mr. Craigle- 
 thorpe's conduct that day. However mistaken 
 and unkind in his way of managing the matter, 
 there was something in this sturdy resistance 
 to the wishes of this fascinating creature, when 
 his judgment told him it was right, that was 
 spirited and manly. 
 
 The quarrel ended at last, as most of their
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 237 
 
 quarrels ended, in a sort of gloomy suUenness. 
 There were no soft yearnings towards a recon- 
 ciliation, no generous self-reproaches upon an 
 after recollection of words which had escaped 
 in passion. 
 
 He was cold, and she was resentful ; and 
 they avoided speaking to each other during 
 the rest of the evening. 
 
 He believed that she hated him more than 
 ever ; and she began to think he did not care 
 for her in the least ; if he did, " how could he 
 be so unkind V 
 
 Yet this observation you might have made, 
 had you been present. That whilst he never 
 once looked her way, her eyes would often 
 furtively cast a glance at him. 
 
 Which cared the most for the other ? 
 
 The last question I have left unanswered; 
 but one thing I can assure you of; whichever 
 it might be that loved the other the best, I 
 know which recovered lost temper the soonest.
 
 238 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Lilla \vent to her party, and amid the in- 
 fluences of a new scene, found her ill-humour 
 dissipate like the morning mist before the sun. 
 It is an experience in these matters we have 
 all doubtless often made, and a phenomenon 
 wonderfully pleasant, as there we stand 
 marvelling where all the phantoms conjured 
 up by passion can possibly be gone. 
 
 He, on the contrary, staid at home by 
 himself, brooding over what had passed, and 
 over the insulting expressions she had used. 
 Nursing in himself feelings the most unkind 
 towards the creature who possessed this power 
 to annoy him. Had she been less wondrously 
 beautiful, it is probable he would have been 
 less implacable. Cowards are cruel. Great 
 beauty exercises in such a case almost a fear- 
 ful power. No generous relentings were 
 excited in his mind by the idea of her woman- 
 hood and her weakness ; to him her beauty 
 was a terrible thing. He absolutely feared it. 
 Her scorn, her indifference, her derision, thus 
 armed, cut him to the very heart ; her ill 
 opinion — her injustice to his motives, wounded 
 him to the very soul.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 239 
 
 He spent an evening of great suffering, and 
 proportionable irritation. Every pang lie en- 
 dured he attributed to her. His nature was 
 revengeful at moments, and he almost panted 
 to be revenged. 
 
 Sleep, which soothes such wounds, had no 
 power here, for he slept little that night ; 
 fevered and restless he laj, meditating upon 
 his injuries ; his sense of them magnified by 
 sleepless reveries. 
 
 When they met at breakfast next morning, 
 she was restored to good humour, but he was 
 only the more angry upon this account ; he 
 took it a proof of her indifference, of her care- 
 lessness as to the effect her violence might 
 have produced upon him; he could not under- 
 stand that it was only the sweet inconsistency 
 of a sunny temper, as yet too near a happy 
 childhood, to retain unpleasing impressions 
 long. 
 
 He went into the city, and was so cross 
 and short with all those with whom he had 
 dealings that day, that people did not know 
 what to make of him.
 
 240 TDIE, THE AVENGER. 
 
 Slie borrowed the money she ^^^anted for 
 her fancy dress from Mrs. Selwyn, who was 
 only too glad to indulge her companion, and 
 please herself at the same time by chaperoning 
 her to this fancy ball. Lilla, in high glee at 
 her success, was already planning some mis- 
 chievous trick to punish Mr. Craiglethorpe 
 when he came back to dinner, which, cross as 
 he was when he went out, she felt instinc- 
 tively certain that he would not be able to 
 refrain from doing. 
 
 What the little mischievous trick she played 
 was I have forgotten, it is so long since. 
 Young girls used to play mischievous tricks to 
 disturb my somewhat precocious gravity, but 
 I cannot recollect one to give you some idea 
 of it. Suffice it to say, that what he ought 
 to have considered as a proof of a sweet for- 
 giving good humour, he took in high dudgeon, 
 as a determination to spite him and turn him 
 into ridicule ; and he was so extremely and 
 gravely offended, that for the first time in her 
 life, she felt really frightened ; and though it 
 is true that a certain little soup^on of awe is
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 241 
 
 necessary to make up the sum of those feel- 
 ings which attach a woman to a man, positive 
 downright fear is almost certain to end in 
 alienating them. 
 
 For the first time she looked at Mr. Oraigle- 
 thorpe, and felt as if she was beginning to 
 dread — almost to dislike him. 
 
 He saw her turn Terj pale, and look ex- 
 ceedingly hurt at what he said. He was sorry 
 he had gone so far ; but he would not go back ; 
 he would not make the slightest concession. 
 She had attempted to make him ridiculous — 
 ridiculous ! — and before herself, and before his 
 sister, and sister's servants. He could not 
 forgive it. 
 
 The face with which she turned away and 
 left the room; the look of innocent, sorrowful, 
 reproachful surprise which it expressed at his 
 extreme and unreasonable anger, haunted him 
 for long afterwards. 
 
 There was something in it, that for the first 
 and the only time just hinted at the existence 
 of a sentiment, in the existence of which he 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 TIME, THE avenger; 
 
 had never dared to entertain the remotest 
 hope. 
 
 Oh! could her heart but have been then 
 revealed to him, how different might both their 
 fates have been !
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 243 
 
 CHArTER X. 
 
 " Her eyes like stars of twilight fair, 
 Like twilight, too, her dusky hair. 
 But all things else about her drawn 
 From daylight and the cheerful dawn." 
 
 Wordsworth. ■ 
 
 People in stories always go to fancj-balls, 
 and offend their guardians, or their husbands, 
 or their grave and sensible lovers. 
 
 It is the regular hanale quarrel. 
 
 Well, I am sorrj, but I cannot help it, if a 
 cause so natural and universal for dispute, as 
 the love of the joung for gaiety upon which 
 they are just entering, and the distaste of the 
 old for gaiety they are just leaving — of the 
 thoughtless indifference to money — the thought- 
 less insensibility to the value of time — the 
 
 E 2
 
 244 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 thoughtless insensibility to the wasteful lavish- 
 ing of health and spirits, which thej feel to be 
 inexhaustible, upon the one hand ; and the 
 prudential resistance to wasteful expense — the 
 serious concern for a time so fastlj fleeting — 
 and an anxiety for that very health and 
 strength so easily wasted and deranged, on the 
 other, — gives occasion for continual contradic- 
 tions between real interest and prudential fore- 
 sight on one hand, and those passionate desires 
 for immediate enjoyment which render the 
 care of the young at once so anxious and so 
 dear a task. I cannot help it if hence causes 
 for disagreement perpetually arise — I cannot 
 help it, if painful and bitter feelings are too 
 often excited ; for who that is old but feels 
 wounded by the inability of the young to 
 understand the true source from which their 
 contradictions arise ; and who that is young is 
 so candid, and temperate, and reasonable, as 
 to consent to and understand this too anxious 
 watchfulness and care ? 
 
 And without candour, indulgence, consi- 
 deration, and reasonableness, upon both sides
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER, 245 
 
 — and a good large portion of these said ex- 
 cellent thino;s too — how is the recurrence of 
 domestic jars to be avoided ? 
 
 In the present case, the above good quali- 
 ties were wanting almost equally. Yet Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe was not an ill-natured man, and 
 would probably have been less harsh and un- 
 yielding, if it had not been to the woman in 
 secret so passionately loved. Neither was she 
 unreasonable or uncandid ; but she could not 
 endure what she thought so unkind from a 
 man of his age, and more especially from 
 him. 
 
 We have seen how ill her little practical 
 joke had been taken. He had looked so sternly 
 — as if he was so deeply offended. He had 
 not said much, but the little he did say was 
 cruel, was bitter in the extreme, and the man- 
 ner in which the words were uttered was so 
 cold, so harsh, so disdainful, that she had 
 been wounded to the quick. 
 
 But as she left the dining-room, she cast at 
 him one look of gentle reproach, so full of 
 sorrowful disappointment at this result of her
 
 246 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 
 
 little attempt to restore their good understand- 
 ing, that his heart smote him, and for the 
 first time in his life, perhaps, he felt that he 
 had been wrong. 
 
 She went up stairs into her own little sitting- 
 room, where she usually took refuge when any- 
 thing had discomposed her. It was a pretty 
 little room, opening out of her bed-room, and 
 at the back of the house looking out upon a 
 little secluded lawn, surrounded by tall trees, 
 and shut out from observation entirely. The 
 window was an old-fashioned casement window, 
 opening outwards ; and thus the old-fashioned, 
 deep window, when the casement was open, 
 afforded a most charming seat, almost outside 
 of the little room. 
 
 Lilla used to love to sit there, and the roses 
 and clematis, which ran monthly in profusion 
 all up that side of the house, made quite a 
 bower over head. For, being rather less 
 attended to by the gardener than other por- 
 tions of his domain, less sheltered from the 
 public gaze, they had been suffered to hang in 
 quite laro;e bunches all about this pretty case-
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 247 
 
 ment Ts^indow. The flowers were now in 
 full bloom. It was quite, as I said, a bower 
 of clustering roses and white and purple cle- 
 matis, which hung about her as there in her 
 window she sat, as she did very often all that 
 summer-time. 
 
 There she read her story-books, — and there 
 she worked at her fancy needle-work, — and 
 there, more often still, she sat doing nothing, 
 idly gazing upon the beautiful trees of the 
 shrubbery, which clustered round the little 
 lawn, or upon a little sparkling waterfall which 
 adorned the transparent canal that termi- 
 nated the lawn upon one side, — watching the 
 fish jump from and break the glittering waters 
 as they fell, or gazing thoughtfully at the blue 
 sky, with the clouds fleetiug over it. Such 
 reveries were to her a source of never-ceasing 
 pleasure. There she would sit, her face lean- 
 ing upon her hand, musing over in thought the 
 days gone by, when her father was with her, 
 her mother living, and she in the beauteous 
 ^East. Then they would return again to
 
 248 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 England, to her present situation, and to Mr. 
 Craiglethorpe. 
 
 The roses clustered round her, and the 
 rising breeze might scatter a shower of tender 
 flower-leaves over her hair, as there she would 
 sit, like some fair princess in an old romance, 
 leaning from the tower of her castle, and 
 looking out for her knight ; but there was no 
 young knight of her own age, alas ! here, to 
 ride prancing bj ; no young and devoted lover, 
 "who understood the true dedication of the 
 heart, to pour forth a sweet love tale upou 
 her ear. 
 
 He who alone possessed in the least degree 
 the power to interest, v>'as like some cruel 
 arch image, who only used his power to irritate 
 and wound ; keeping her in a rude captivity ; 
 denying her pleasures in which her young 
 heart so naturally delighted; and forcing her to 
 obtain from others what she would have taken 
 so much afibctionate pleasure in receiving at 
 his hands. 
 
 She had left the room, as I told you, with a
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 249 
 
 sort of sad surprise mingling with her look 
 of deeply- wounded and disappointed feeling. 
 
 The surprise was such as you may have seen 
 upon the face of some little child, liarshly 
 scolded for some trifling peccadillo, in which it, 
 for the first time learns there is any harm ; 
 the wounded feeling was that of a woman who 
 is struck by the hand which she ought to have 
 found most tender. 
 
 She went up hastily to her room, took 
 shelter like a bird in her little bower of roses, 
 and began to cry like a deserted child. She 
 felt so utterly desolate that day. 
 
 Someway, since her first arrival in Eng- 
 land, she had never before felt so entirely 
 alone ; for, from the first moment when she 
 had given her hand upon the deck of the 
 vessel to Mr. Oraiglethorpe, she had felt that 
 she was protected, and in the hands of a 
 friend. 
 
 Very soon, that she was in the hands of 
 something beyond a friend. 
 
 He had been often hard, often petulant, 
 usually contradictory, but she had never seen
 
 250 TIME, THE AYEK-GER. 
 
 liim rcallj offended before. She had taken 
 a pleasure in teasing him, and persisting till 
 he uttered some rash hasty sentence or other, 
 'which she had tlie delight of seeing repented 
 of as soon as uttered 
 
 But to-daj he had been offended— deeply 
 offended, he had been really angry. He had 
 made her feel that she had, in her playful- 
 ness, gone beyond a certain line, which could 
 not be passed ^vith impunity ; that there were 
 freedoms upon which she must not venture, 
 eyen she, with him. She felt, for the first 
 time, that there was a limit to her power over 
 his feehno^s. 
 
 Till now all had been vague. She had never 
 ventured to provoke liim so far, but that she 
 had felt she might still have ventured further. 
 
 In the fond security of her heart, indeed, 
 she had believed her power to be unlimited ; 
 but that w^as a mistake she found, at last. 
 -What a change this made in her feelings ! 
 And all for such a little tiling ! 
 
 It seemed to her such a very little thing 
 -to occasion so much to do. She had no pride
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 251 
 
 of this sort herself; how should she find a 
 standard bj which to measure the pride of 
 another? It seemed to her woman's heart, 
 that cherishing as she did a secret partiality 
 for this strange man, everything ought to have 
 been thought reasonable — everything ought 
 to have been permitted to her. 
 
 Little did she understand the true nature of 
 pride — and she forgot, too, that this secret 
 partiality was wholly unsuspected by its object. 
 And she little guessed, moreover, that, on the 
 contrary, he believed himself to be only an 
 object of dislike for his harshness — and secret 
 contempt, perhaps derision, for his ugliness 
 and his age. Contempt, the most insup- 
 portable feeling ; derision, the most irritating 
 suspicion that could vex a proud temper like 
 his. 
 
 She sat now, amidst this bower of hers, 
 surrounded with roses and clematis, as I told 
 you, there were her two little pet turtle-doves 
 in their cage, hanging out of her window, and 
 cooing so softly as if to soothe her feelings. 
 At first she cried very much ; but at last she
 
 252 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 gave over, and, then wiping her eyes, she sat 
 there musing ; and very melancholy and down- 
 cast she felt. She looked pretty as she was, 
 quite forlorn, with her braids and tresses of 
 hair a good deal disordered by her passion, 
 but in spite of that, still most lovely. There 
 was that rare loveliness which neither passion 
 or emotion can deform ; it would almost seem 
 as if the disorder of her looks added to their 
 charms. 
 
 She had sat there crying, till her hand- 
 kerchief was saturated with her tears ; but at 
 last the tears were exhausted, and after sob- 
 bing a little time, just like a baby, as she still 
 almost was, she gradually began to feel more 
 composed, though still, poor little thing, feel- 
 ing very sad. So she leaned out of her win- 
 dow, and began to talk to her two little doves, 
 pleased with their sweet rosy eyes, and their 
 little black collars, and their gentle mien, and 
 still more tender voices, as they kept cooing 
 there ; and she could not help thinking, as she 
 listened to the voice of their fond affection, 
 how sweet it must be to be fondled and ten- 
 derly beloved.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 253 
 
 How delightful, how more than sweet to 
 be loved with tenderness by such a strong, 
 severe, and manlj character as Mr. Craigle- 
 thorpe^s ! To be his darling, his treasure, his 
 idol, and his fondling, as her young imagination 
 painted to her it might have been between one 
 of his years and experience and one of her 
 years and loveliness. But instead of this fond 
 charm, how was if? 
 
 Far from being tender, he was not commonly 
 kind. Far from being his darling, he did not 
 care for her — he seemed to hate her. No 
 tender flattery — no fond indulgence for her — 
 roughness, and harshness, and contradiction, 
 was all she ever got from him. 
 
 She had left him with tears in her eyes, 
 called forth by his rudeness and barbarity — 
 and here she had been sitting in this little 
 remote chamber of hers, crying her eyes out — 
 and what had he cared 1 If he had cared in 
 the least he would surely have contrived some 
 way or other to have crept round the shrub- 
 beries to the lawn, and watched her, and seen 
 her weep, and been ashamed and sorry for his 
 cruelty.
 
 254 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 But no, he cared not in the least — not he. 
 
 He didn't mind what she suffered — what she 
 felt. Well, then, she would be even with him. 
 She would not care for what he felt. Him ! 
 Why should she? — He! an oddish, ugly, un- 
 amiable man — what on earth could there be in 
 him to care for? 
 
 If he had only done so much as just come 
 out to look after her — to trouble himself about 
 her being unhappy ; to be uneasy because of 
 those tears, which he had caused to flow ; it 
 would have been different, it would have showed 
 some heart, some pity, at least. 
 
 But he had no heart, not an atom of heart 
 — so she said to herself in her anger. 
 
 And yet she knew, poor dear! that it was 
 not so altogether; and it was this conviction, 
 added to this hope to touch that heart, which 
 preserved the influence he held over her mind 
 in spite of all his unkindness. 
 
 But he was not so hard-hearted and indif- 
 ferent to the pain he had given — he was not 
 even so far off as Lilla thought. 
 
 She still kept looking out of the window —
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 255 
 
 and now she was busy stretching out her fair 
 arm and hand, trying to gather some clusters 
 of roses which hung almost below her reach. 
 
 Very much discontented with himself, 
 Mr. Craigiethorpe had left the dining-room 
 soon after Lilla quitted it ; and, seeing the 
 hall-door open, he had wandered into the 
 garden. 
 
 He did not feel inclined to take the usual 
 walk in front of the plantation, and in full 
 view of the drawing-room windows, but, turn- 
 ing into a little path cut through the shrub- 
 beries, went sauntering on, ignorant or unheed- 
 ing where it led. 
 
 His spirits were very unusually discom- 
 posed. 
 
 He felt that he had been harsh, unjust, 
 wrong. It was an unusual feeling for him to 
 be vexed with himself. It was very seldom 
 that he was aware of his own harshness or 
 alive to his own injustice. Never, almost, that 
 he would acknowledge himself to be in that 
 he was in fault. 
 
 To own the truth, his purposes were in
 
 256 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 general so honourable and so right, that so far 
 he was seldom, I might almost saj never, in 
 the wrong — but his means of accomplishing 
 them were usually so faulty, that, so far, he 
 might be said to be almost never in the right. 
 
 A common case. People who are satisfied 
 with the rectitude of their own intentions are 
 too apt to be very careless as to the manner 
 in which such intentions are carried out — and 
 so much pain is daily and hourly given by 
 roughness, want of indulgence to the follies of 
 others, w^ant of justice in making due allow- 
 ances for their characters and ways of think- 
 ing, that it is enough to make one almost sick 
 of good intentions. 
 
 The wounded, reproachful, but gentle looks 
 with which his young ward had left the room 
 after the expression of his unreasonable resent- 
 ment at the playful trick she had played, 
 haunted him — he could not get rid of it. 
 
 He felt so uncomfortable and restless, that 
 he did not know what to do. Not that 
 he longed for an explanation — not that he 
 yearned to confess he had been unjust ; to
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 257 
 
 ask her to forgive and be reconciled — softened 
 as were his feelings, they did not amount to 
 any thing like this. To confess himself in 
 the Avrong to such a child, would never have 
 entered his head — still less to sue for her for- 
 giveness, or attempt a reconciliation. 
 
 Such thino-s were not in him — such relent- 
 ing visitings — such sweet effusion of the feel- 
 ings — those relentings and effusions so soft and 
 sweet that they make even a quarrel almost 
 dear between those who love, were not for him. 
 It could not be said of him, as poor Charles 
 Lambe said of himself and his mother — 
 
 "And yet among our little bickerings, 
 Domestic jars, there was I know not what 
 Of tender sweetness." 
 
 Proud natures such as his, wrapt up in 
 their own self-esteem and coldness, never 
 know those tender meltings of the heart that 
 attend upon an*^honest reconciliation. 
 
 Still, no doubt, he felt exceedingly uncom- 
 fortable and restless. He wanted to see her 
 again, to see, at least, how she was looking 
 
 VOL. I. s
 
 258 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 now, how it would be when next thej met. 
 He was pleased and he was displeased at the 
 feeling she had shown. Pleased, because it 
 proved her sensibility to his reproaches, — 
 displeased, becaused it seemed to reproach 
 him in her turn. 
 
 Pleased, however, or displeased, one thing 
 he never reflected upon, — how entirely his 
 mind was getting into the habit of being 
 absorbed by one subject. How entirely his 
 happiness was no longer in his own power. 
 
 Meditating thus upon her, and never re- 
 flecting upon himself, — either to blame him- 
 self, pity himself, or fear for himself, — so he 
 goes wandering on through the winding walk 
 of the shrubbery, never thinking to which 
 side of the house it might lead, still less whose 
 window might look out upon it ; until, issuing 
 from an arched walk, he found himself under 
 the branches of a lofty sycamore and giant 
 plane tree, which cast their arms far and 
 wide, and, after the manner of those trees, 
 dropping them to the earth on every side, bo 
 that a man might shelter undiscovered under-
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 259 
 
 neath. He found himself standing upon the 
 edge of the little secluded lawn, and, looking 
 up, was aware that he was exactly opposite 
 that casement window, now standing open, 
 half-buried with leaves and flowers, among 
 which was the fairest flower — the only flower 
 he ever cared to look upon — She sat there, 
 leaning forward, her beautiful hair scattering 
 over her face, her fair arms, stretched out, 
 gathering, or attempting to gather the flowers 
 which were almost beyond her reach. 
 
 He could see her, but she could not see 
 him. 
 
 He could see her face, and he could plainly 
 enough discoyer that she had been crying; 
 for her cheeks were still blistered with her 
 tears, looking like those of a little child that 
 had been well scolded. But, unlike a child, 
 it did not seem that she had forgotten the 
 cause of her tears as soon as she had ceased 
 shedding them, for there was something 
 mournful and a sort of dreary, desolate 
 expression in her face, that he could not help 
 feeling touched by. 
 
 S 2
 
 260 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 The scene was so charming, too, altogether, 
 as he stood there and watched her ; the 
 evening so surpassingly lovely, that, little given 
 as he was to such influences, he was unusually 
 moved by it. 
 
 His heart was softened and melted 
 strangely. 
 
 He stood there a long time watching 
 her. 
 
 Sometimes she leaned out of her window, 
 stretched out those fair arms, and seemed 
 intent upon catching some truant branch or 
 other ; then she gathered her flowers into 
 her hands, and sat there on the window-seat, 
 leaning against the side, holding her roses 
 before her, bending her head over them, 
 looking very thoughtful and melancholy, and 
 every now and then sighing deeply. 
 
 To find her so sorrowful, when, suspicious 
 as he was of affectation, there was not a 
 possibility that she was making a scene, 
 affected him more than all. 
 
 He longed to come forward, to speak, to 
 say something. He had never felt so moved,
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 261 
 
 SO placable, so tender, — nay, so sorry for wliat 
 he had done, before. 
 
 He gently lifted up the overhanging 
 branches of this huge spreading plane tree, 
 intending to come forward and speak ; say 
 something, he knew not what ; the rustling 
 of the leaves aroused her attention, — he saw 
 her turn, and glance rapidly his way. 
 
 More moved by impetuous impulse than 
 ever he had been in his life, he was rushing 
 forward to speak, — when, oh! unfortunate 
 lover ! and oh ! most hapless, hapless chance, 
 as it proved ! — What trifles decide upon the 
 destiny of man ! 
 
 A bough, caught by the one he was lifting, 
 suddenly struck him in the face, knocked off 
 his hat, and sent him stumbling and almost 
 prostrate, much quicker than he had intended, 
 upon the grass-plat before her. 
 
 He did not see her smile, or all would have 
 been over between them at once, — but smile 
 she did. How could she help it *? And laugh 
 outright she must have done, if she had not 
 been so out of spirits.
 
 262 TIME, THE A AVENGER. 
 
 She turned a way her head — her little, 
 naiiglitj head, however, enjoying his morti- 
 fication, and all her happy gaiety returning. 
 
 He was there, then ; that was in itself 
 enough. Why did he come there ? Why, 
 of all places in the world '? AVhy, but for 
 one of all the reasons in the world, that the 
 grass-plat lay before the window, the window 
 of that offender, not to be forgiven, who sat 
 there, bewailing her offences and his stony- 
 heartedness. 
 
 And now, that stern, proud, unbending 
 man, where had he been all this time 1 
 Standing under a green tree, opposite her 
 window, watching her ; and where was he 
 now, haughty guardian, who could not endure 
 being made the subject of the most innocent 
 joke "? Why, where was he ? Not stepping 
 forward in dignified composure from behind 
 his screen, but tumbling head foremost, in 
 the most ridiculous manner, almost to her 
 feet. 
 
 It was impossible not to laugh ; her spirits 
 thus revived, how could she help but laugh ?
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 263 
 
 Her shoulder, wliich slie turned away from 
 him, began to shake a little, — he looked so 
 delightfully disconsolate — rubbing his knee, 
 which had been grazed a little as he stumbled 
 upon the grass, — but she had her lesson, and 
 not for the world would she have dared to let 
 him see her laugh. 
 
 He did see her, though, — in spite of all the 
 pains she took to conceal her merriment, and 
 her endeavour to save his dignity, by pre- 
 tending not to have seen him. 
 
 He did not speak. She began to be a little 
 alarmed at his silence, and cast a furtive 
 glance at him. She saw him bending down, 
 still rubbing his knee. He did not look up, 
 but his face was crimson. 
 
 " Pride must have a fall," thought she, as 
 she looked down upon him from her elevation, 
 sitting there like a bird in a bower of roses, 
 and looking as if she were ready to take wing. 
 " But he looks dreadfully angry. I hope to 
 goodness he did not see me laugh." 
 
 And as she watched him, lier spirits all 
 returned, her heart dancing with triumph.
 
 264 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 You may be sure that this little awkward 
 and mortifjung incident effectually took away 
 his inclination to address her; and he was 
 turning away to retrace his steps ; but she, 
 who found all her courage and sauciness re- 
 stored by his humiliation, and by the certainty 
 that he must have come there solely on her 
 account, looked down. Pleased she looked, and 
 pleased she was — happy she looked, and happy 
 she was. Oh! could he but have trusted to 
 that gay, innocent, girlish smile! — but he 
 could not. Happy she looked, and he felt it 
 as an affront; for he had seen her laugh. 
 Smile she did, and he thought it an insult; 
 for she had turned away to laugh at him. 
 But she, too pleased to regard his coldness or 
 his ill-humour, and holding out her hand, filled 
 with a bundle of roses, cried : 
 
 "They are so sweet, Mr. Craiglethorpe ; 
 won't you have some'?" 
 
 She longed to add a tender inquiry how his 
 knee felt; but she resisted the temptation, 
 and the still greater one of flying down and 
 running away with his lost hat, which he was
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 265. 
 
 HOW looking for among the slirubs, where it 
 had rolled, and which she saw plain enough. 
 But she had had her lesson, she dared do no 
 such thing. She tried again at looking yerj 
 demure and compassionate; and she repeated: 
 
 "Thej are rerj sweet — won't you have 
 some ?" 
 
 He kept looking for his hat, as if he did not 
 or would not hear her; and yet the voice 
 made that heart of his tremble so. It was so 
 sweet. But the sweeter it sounded, the more 
 he felt fascinated by that young face peering 
 upon him out of that bower of roses, — the 
 more mad with himself, the more out of 
 humour with her, he was. The evil demon 
 kept painting him to himself tumbling out of 
 the branches, and the ridiculous figure he must 
 have made. He dreaded her ridicule above 
 all things, and he chose to believe he was the 
 object of her ridicule, and that her good- 
 natured offers of consolation, in the shape of a 
 bunch of roses, was only a proof of it. Much 
 he cared for roses ! 
 
 " Well," she said, piqued, or pretending to
 
 266 TIME, THE AYENGER. 
 
 be piqued, at last, bj his obstinate silence, 
 *' jou won't liaye tliem 1 Then thus I scatter 
 all mj good dispositions to the winds," she 
 added. 
 
 And slie tore the flowers in pieces, tossed 
 them into the air, and thej flew scattering 
 round the garden ; whilst he, having found his 
 hat, pressed it firmlj on his head, and walked 
 awaj in all the dignity of man, without once 
 deigning to turn his head again towards her. 
 
 Then she did laugh — lauglied out — laughed 
 aloud — in contempt, in vexation, in derision, 
 in mockerj. He heard her, — the ringing, 
 mocking laugh pursued him, as he fled — he 
 heard it through the trees, as they closed over 
 him. It was to him like the laugh of some 
 malicious demon. 
 
 The eff'ect produced upon him bj this in- 
 cident, so ridiculously trifling, was quite fearful. 
 That produced upon her bv his determined 
 ill-humour and avoidance, was still more fatal. 
 From that time they never recovered anything 
 like a good understanding. 
 
 Circumstances misht and did increase their
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 267 
 
 alienation, strengthen and embitter their ad- 
 Terse feelings; but nothing occurred to bring 
 them together more. 
 
 When they met at tea, she was sullen and 
 offended — he kept his eyes fixed upon the 
 newspaper, which he pretended to bo intently 
 reading. He never offered to give or take 
 her cup ; he never addressed her by a single 
 word ; he would not even look at her. 
 
 Her spirit was far too higli to brook this 
 unjust treatment. Whatever her feelings might 
 have been, or might have become towards him, 
 in the indignation of the present moment one 
 thought only was uppermost — to conquer; 
 but at all events to conceal them. She would 
 drive from her heart tlie strange, infatuated 
 sentiment, that made his behaviour of too 
 much importance to her happiness; but above 
 all, he should never have the gratification of 
 knowing how great that importance might be. 
 Pride, resentment, the pangs of disappointed 
 affection, and slighted kindness were swelling 
 in her bosom ; the tears now and then would 
 rise to her eyes, but she repressed them reso-
 
 268 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 lutelj. She would have let her heart burst 
 rather than give utterance to one of those 
 sighs with which it was heaving. 
 
 " Well, my dear, jou are really delightful 
 company,^^ began Mrs. Selwyn. " Brother, I 
 do wish you would put down that tiresome 
 newspaper for one single moment, and gossip 
 a little. What is the matter with you '? And 
 as for you, my charming Lilla, you look I 
 don't know how — I declare one might think 
 you had been actually crying." 
 
 "/ crying!" she cried, looking up, with a 
 little scornful laugh. 
 
 "Well, my love, — nothiug \erj extraor- 
 dinary if you had; for I must own you do 
 lead a sad, stupid life here ; and I for one, at 
 your age, I am sure, should have been ready 
 to have cried my eyes out, for want of some- 
 thing better to do. But things are about to 
 mend. There's a beau arrived in these parts 
 that will brighten things up a little. Oh! 
 such a charming fellow ! Do you know, 
 brother, Valentine — Valentine Daubeney, in 
 short, is come home'?"
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 269 
 
 He affected not to hear ; but tlie newspaper 
 shook in his hand a httle. 
 
 " What can jou be so absorbed in *? I 
 declare, Lilla, he doesn't hear one word I say. 
 Always just like that when there's anything 
 in the newspaper; and I don't suppose he 
 cares a pin's head about Valentine Daubeney, 
 — for the Daubeneys are people not much in 
 his line. So let him alone, and I'll keep my 
 news for you. It's more interesting to you 
 and me, my dear. Do you know, I have been 
 in secret quite vexed for you ever since you 
 came — for, of course, now Mr. Selwyn's away, 
 I can't see much of young gentlemen, unless 
 my brother would bring one down now and 
 then — which he never will — and so it has 
 really been very dull for you. Not one bit of 
 flirtation has it been possible for you to get 
 up. But now it will be different, for Valen- 
 tine Daubeney is the most determined flirt in 
 the universe, and goes everywhere ; and as the 
 Daubeneys' country-place is out this way, we 
 shall meet him everywhere, though you have
 
 270 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 never seen tliem jet, because thej have been 
 in town ever since jou came/' 
 
 "No — not anj of them." 
 
 " "Well, I am so glad Valentine's come 
 home, — at least, I thought he never would, he 
 was so long about it. Oh, he's such a darling! 
 You will be over head and ears in love with 
 him, take mj word for it, before jou know 
 where jou are, — that's the way wnth every- 
 body ; and as for him! he'll rave about you. 
 You are just made to drive him wild, with 
 your beauty, and your elegance, and your 
 sweet taste in dress. And then they're so 
 rich, those Daubeneys, — they say they might 
 line that great mansion of theirs in the city 
 with gold, if they would. Brother, do put 
 down the newspaper : tell me what was it 
 said Valentine's father was worth I and he is 
 the only son, — the only child." 
 
 He had not read one word of his newspaper 
 since Lilla came into the room, but the less he 
 read the more he chose to appear to read. 
 He was obstinately silent.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 271 
 
 " Brother/' getting up, and giving him a 
 little blow upon the shoulder, " will you listen, 
 or will you not, to what I am saying 1" 
 
 " Well, what are you saying?" tartly, as if 
 awakened from sleep. 
 
 " Why, tliat my darling beau, Valentine 
 Daubeney's at last come home." 
 
 " Well, what do I care T 
 
 " Care ! Nay, I suppose you don't much 
 care ; he^s not a man's man, that's certain ; 
 but Lilla, Miss Fleming. — I can assure you, 
 he's quite and altogether a woman's man. 
 Oh, he's the handsomest, gayest, most elegant 
 creature, — and quite fond of me ; — so we shall 
 be sure to have him here. And he will be as 
 rich as Croesus. Brother, I say, do tell us, — 
 ain't old Daubeney cruel rich V 
 
 " I neither know nor care anything about 
 their riches, — what's the use of bothering me 
 in this way about them V 
 
 " Pooh, pooh, — don't be angry. I declare 
 you are growing quite a cross-pated brother. 
 I can't think what's the matter with you. 
 Miss Fleming, what shall we do with him 1
 
 272 
 
 Wliat's the matter with jou, Richard ? I saj, 
 I never saw anything so changed as jou are. 
 Why, JOU used to bs always so fond of com- 
 pany, so full of engagements, one hardly got 
 a peep of you here, though when you did 
 come you were abundantly pleasant and good- 
 natured ; and now you're alw^ays coming and 
 going nowhere, as if you could not live out of 
 the house ; and yet, when you come, you're so 
 grumpy, there's no knowing how to please you. 
 What can be the matter with you? He's not 
 falhng in love, sure ! Miss Fleming '?" 
 
 " I should think Mr. Craiglethorpe the last 
 man to be guilty of that folly," said Lilla, 
 sarcastically. 
 
 " She would think it, then, the extremity of 
 folly in me" the studier of the newspaper 
 thought to himself; "I will take care she 
 shall have no reason to accuse me of it, as 
 regards her." 
 
 He now laid down his new^spaper, and 
 looking steadily at his sister, said, — " When 
 you ever detect me in such egregious nonsense 
 as that, — when you ever find me caring one
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 273 
 
 brass farthing for any one woman upon earth 
 more than another, — I give you leave to put 
 the cap and bells upon my head, and parade 
 me up and down Walthamstow for a fool." 
 
 And then he took up his newspaper again, 
 and continued to pretend to read. 
 
 " Well, 1 meant no harm, I am sure, did I, 
 Lilla 1 — but really, Richard, I must say your 
 temper is quite changed, and none for the 
 better ; you cannot bear the least little inno- 
 cent bit of a joke. I am sure I felt perfectly 
 ashamed at the rage you put yourself into on 
 account of Lilians little mischievous trick at 
 dinner. Wasn't he terribly cross, Lilla, my 
 dear r 
 
 " I didn't observe much, — yes, — I believe 
 he was cross. Full-grown men can behave 
 like babies at times, as well as full-grown 
 women, — I know that very well ; and when 
 such happens to be the case, I pay no more 
 attention to their humours than I should do 
 to those of a spoiled child of three years old — 
 Annoyed at the fuss they are making, perhaps, 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 but utterly indifferent, when it's a matter of 
 mere temper/' 
 
 " Right, mj dear ; and I wish Richard 
 would not give way to his temper as he has 
 lately done. But let him alone, he does not 
 care a sixpence for what either you or I say." 
 
 " No, — that I am sure he does not." 
 
 " So let us talk of something else. Oh, of 
 that delightful Valentine ! Isn't it a sweet 
 pretty name ? And then he has such a 
 temper! never was tnown to be out of hu- 
 mour in his life, as dear Mrs. Daubeney has 
 often and often told me. Always gay, always 
 so much to say for himself, — always so good- 
 humoured ; and then he has the sweetest 
 eyes, and such a smile ! Oh, Lilla, Lilla, if 
 you don't go stark, staring mad about him, 
 never believe me again." 
 
 " Dear Mrs. Selwjn, you quite frighten me 
 with your description. What must one do 
 with such an irresistible charmer V 
 
 "Do with him ? — Why, fall in love with 
 him, and make him fall in love with you, 
 which you'll do in no time. And then to have
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 275 
 
 all tlie girls in the nciglibourhood dying with 
 envy of yoii — for they one and all love him — 
 will be such fun. But I must tell you he's a 
 dreadful flirt — He's been in love in his way 
 with them all in their turn ; but none of them 
 can fix him — Such wearing of the willow, my 
 dear — but with you all that will be quite 
 another thing. I shall be so proud if you 
 make a real bond Me conquest of him, — which 
 I am certain you will. Brother, do speak — do 
 tell me — has not Mr. Daubeney, the father, 
 lately purchased a fine estate in some out-of- 
 the-way county or other? 
 
 " How should I know or care T 
 
 " Why, who should know, if you don't, you 
 city put, you % Really you quite vex one. I 
 can't think what's the reason of all this spite 
 against the Daubeney s to-day. I have heard 
 you own that Valentine was a fine young man; 
 and his father stands so high in the City, that 
 every body respects Kimr 
 
 "I always thought Valentine, as you are 
 pleased to call him, a specious, empty cox- 
 comb ; and as for the father — he's well enough ; 
 
 T 2
 
 276 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 but it will not be he who'll set tlie Thames on 
 fire." 
 
 " Perhaps not ; but what has that to do 
 with it \ Bub now, just be pleased to look up 
 and tell me — wouldn't it be a nice thing if 
 Lilla could make a conquest of Valentine 
 Daubeney, and we could make up a match — it 
 would be a capital thing for her." 
 
 "Nonsense, mj dear Mrs. Selwjn," said 
 Lilla, laughing. 
 
 But Mr. Oraiglethorpe answered not. All 
 he did was — looking very red and angry — to 
 rise hastily, push back his chair, and leave the 
 room. He banged the door roughly enough 
 after him, and was rewarded for this last 
 exhibition of ill-humour by hearing the merry 
 laugh of the two ladies, the pleasant ringing 
 sound of which followed him into the hall. 
 
 They saw no more of him that day. He 
 went straight to the stables, and mounting his 
 horse, rode to town by a beautiful moonlight, 
 as insensible to the loveliness of the scene, and 
 as uncomfortable and abstracted in his feelings 
 as mortal man could be.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 277 
 
 In vain the fair planet slione soft over the 
 forest glades, and quivered upon the little lakes 
 and pools, casting large masses of tranquil 
 light and shade upon the grass as he passed. 
 Vain for him the gentle solemnity, the serene 
 calm of the beautiful night — in vain the night- 
 ingales were singing to each other from shrub- 
 bery to shrubbery. The influences of nature 
 were lost upon his vexed spirit. He was no 
 lover of nature at the best ; but had he been 
 the veriest poet that ever revelled in such 
 feelings, they would have been powerless to 
 dissipate his thoughts. 
 
 A confusion of the most distracting images 
 was hurrying through his mind — Valentine — 
 Miss Fleming— his sister — and, worst of all, 
 himself!
 
 278 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 " .... I came upon the great 
 Pavilion of the Caliphat; 
 Right to the cavern cedarn floors ; 
 Broad-based flights of marble stairs 
 Ran up, with golden balustrades." 
 
 For an old man, ^^ho pretends, too, to set up 
 for somewhat of a philosopher, I am ashamed 
 to saj how fond 1 am of a gaj party — a really 
 gay party, — not a mere grand rout or drum, 
 where people are crowding each other to death, 
 and repeating a set of conventional phrases to 
 each other during the whole evening ; though 
 in a corner now and then one may, even here, 
 get a choice morsel of conversation when good 
 fortune favours. No — what I am so foolishly 
 fond of is — a really gay, animated pai'ty. 
 When a set of young people met truly to 
 enjoy themselves, are dancing away to those
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 279 
 
 inspiriting polkas and waltzes, wliicli I take 
 such a foolish pleasure in watching — Such gaj, 
 airj, prettj girls as one sees ! — Such lively, 
 pleasant young men ! laughing and chatting, or 
 tearing and whirling about the room as if they 
 were half crazy. And then those dear, good 
 mammas, sitting so patiently and stupidly by 
 each other against the wall. Content so that 
 their children are happy! 
 
 Yes, I do like it, but with a proviso. 
 
 I must not have your people of high position. 
 People in society. Who go to half a dozen 
 parties every night, six days out of the seven, 
 for three months out of the twelve, in pursuit 
 of business, not pleasure ; for pleasure, too 
 often repeated, be it remarked, cannot by pos- 
 sibility continue pleasure. Kot in pursuit of 
 a little pleasure these, but in the way of their 
 regular calling, to bring their girls out, and car- 
 rying them about to get married. My balls must 
 not be of this sort ; they must not be like mar- 
 kets and fairs ; they must not be such at all. 
 The balls I enjoy are in societies where a ball 
 is still an event. Still a thing of which young
 
 280 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 girls dream before it comes off, and for a good 
 many nights after, mayhap. 
 
 Balls of which the number they have had 
 may be counted upon the sticks of the fans 
 behind which they are prattling to each 
 other. Balls enjoyed by that large, large mass 
 of people who are not society; but who are 
 extremely happy in their own circles and in 
 their own ways. 
 
 If they but know their happiness, that is 
 to say. 
 
 And are not bitten with the too common 
 rage of thinking that no true bliss exists except 
 Avithin that magical circle from which they 
 find themselves excluded. So learning to de- 
 spise the easy pleasure of amusing themselves 
 with people belonging to their own natural 
 condition in life. 
 
 The fancy ball to which I am going to take 
 you, fulfilled, in great measure, my require- 
 ments. It was, I own, rather more splendid 
 than my conscience allows me quite to approve ; 
 because the habit of making pleasure so mag- 
 nificent is apt to make pleasure too difficult.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGEE. 281 
 
 Besides, as a matter of taste, I really do not 
 like a very great display of luxury and ex- 
 pense. 
 
 I tliink it oppressive rather than enjoyable ; 
 it savours of ostentation — of a trivial taste — a 
 want of earnestness, where a mere passing 
 occasion is made a subject of so much trouble- 
 some (somewhere) preparation and serious exer- 
 tion ; though there are occasions now and then 
 when even I can forgive a regular grand ball. 
 
 There are times when, from people whom I 
 know can thorouglily well afford it, I accept 
 it as a change that pleases one well. And this 
 happened to be the case now. 
 
 This ball was given upon some special occa- 
 sion by the wife of a rich banker and India 
 director ; a man of wealth not to be counted. 
 A man of a magnificent spirit in all things — 
 In charities as well as in ball-giving, for he 
 was a sincere lover of his kind; and a consci- 
 entious dispenser of the wealth acquired by a 
 course of persevering industry and unimpeach- 
 able honour. I therefore did not like him the 
 less that it was now and then his pleasure to
 
 282 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 give the joimg ladies upon the Essex side of 
 London as grand an entertainment as was ever 
 got lip in Grosvenor or Belgrave Squares. 
 
 It was to be a fancy ball, and it was the 
 verj ball Lilla and Mr. Craiglethorpe had 
 quarrelled about. 
 
 He had been invited himself by Mrs. Brooks- 
 bank ; but catch him at a ball! At a good 
 dinner, if you please, and as often as you liked ; 
 but at a ball ! — 
 
 But if he had been a frequenter of balls, and 
 had gone to every ball that ever was given in 
 the region of the forest, he would have refused 
 to go to this. 
 
 He could have no pleasure in seeing Lilla 
 dance as she did, like an angel ; that was the 
 foolish way I heard people praising her. She 
 possessed far too much power of fascination for 
 his peace, as it was. Her loveliness was too 
 potent already. He might conceal, and he 
 might resist, but he could not triumph over 
 its influences. He was not inclined enough to 
 expose himself farther to the effects of the 
 poison which was destroying him. He was a
 
 TIME, THE ave:^ger. 283 
 
 firm man, — he was resolved to shake off 
 these humiliatinsf fetters, not add weis^ht to 
 them. 
 
 He was at this moment more deeply offended 
 with her than ever. 
 
 The little sarcasm that had escaped her, 
 and which he applied to himself, as to the folly 
 of his falling in love, for so he read it, rankled 
 at his heart. 
 
 He was one of those imfortunate people who 
 never forget injuries. I scarcely know a greater 
 curse than that of being never able to obliterate 
 the memory of an offence given from the 
 recollection. 
 
 To go to this ball and stand by, an idle 
 spectator, whilst she was dancing in the gay 
 innocence of her heart, and lavishing her sweet 
 smiles upon others, would have completed the 
 measure of that madness to which he was so 
 unwilling a victim. 
 
 Some like to go where those they love will 
 be, — they cannot resist the fascinations of that 
 enchantment which draws them on. This
 
 284 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 determined man was at least master of himself 
 so far. 
 
 He could not help going down to his sister's, 
 it is true, but he could help making a fool of 
 himself by following the too dear deluder into 
 public. 
 
 It was a very, very large room — room, I 
 ought not to call it, in fact, it was no room 
 at all, properly speaking, — in which this 
 entertainment was given. The time of the 
 year was early in June, as you know by the 
 nightingales, and the weather was deliciously 
 warm. This splendid apartment, intended 
 for dancing, had been run up for the occasion 
 
 by Messrs. , the miracles of whose 
 
 creation have succeeded to those of the 
 Aladdin's lamp, being quite as magnificent, 
 and almost as instantaneous; only produced 
 under the influence of a different Genius than 
 his, — not him of the lamp, but him of the 
 mine.
 
 TIME, THE AYENGEE. 285 
 
 It was to the eye as charming a room as 
 could be imagined, — only one could hardly 
 help regretting that it was all to go away 
 
 next morning upon Messrs. 's 
 
 waggons, — That what was so excessively beau- 
 tiful s]iould be so unsubstantial — the mere 
 fabric of a vision — literally a dream. 
 
 One cannot help something of this when 
 gazing upon these dazzling palaces of an 
 hour. 
 
 This one was huno: from ceilins^ to floor with 
 rose-coloured silk and white muslin spangled 
 and fringed with gold, — the ceiling itself being 
 of a bright soft blue, with a galaxy of lights, 
 like stars; and from it immense chandeliers 
 depended, with chains upon chains of pendent 
 drops, sparkling with all the colours of the 
 rainbow. The floor was chalked with wreaths 
 of flowers that seemed as if you must crush 
 them. A soft perfume of attar of roses was 
 just perceptible in the air, — whilst, on every 
 side, pyramids, very groves of flowers, of moss 
 roses, jessamines, myrtles, and geraniums, 
 camellias and flowers that every one knows
 
 286 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 personally and loves, — proper furniture 
 flowers, — rose from the floor to the top of 
 the room. 
 
 It was, indeed, a very delightful spectacle. 
 
 Then the people walking about in it ! 
 
 Such a yarietj of pretty fancy dresses ! 
 — Such a wealth of pretty faces ! — Such a 
 charming and rich confusion of forms and 
 colours ! 
 
 Here was a French marchioness, with her 
 powdered toupee, the black velvet round her 
 neck fastened by a solitaire diamond; her 
 rich pink silk gown looped up behind, and 
 showing the white satin petticoat beneath; 
 her fan covered with beautiful pictures and 
 sparkling with foil. There a shepherdess with 
 her hoop and her laced apron, and flounced 
 petticoat and gown; and her hair rolled up, 
 and a little fantastical hat with blue ribbons 
 coquettishly set upon one side of it, — ^just as 
 if she had stepped down from a piece of 
 Dresden china. And there, a charming 
 Spanisli girl, with her rich dress all surrounded 
 with long Vandykes of bugles, and her dark
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 287 
 
 hair with one deep scarlet rose peeping from 
 behind the black lace mantilla thrown over 
 all. Or a Roman peasant girl, with her 
 boddice and her roof of white linen above 
 her pretty face ; or a Swiss girl, with her 
 well-known black velvet laced body and 
 white sleeves, and two tails of plaited hair 
 which reached almost to her very feet, and 
 so on. But here comes the loveliest of them 
 all, — that Greek girl, — the Haidee, the Leila. 
 More beautiful than the morning star, with 
 that fillet of pearls braiding her long flow- 
 ing hair; with that Eastern dress which 
 sets off her beauteous figure to such advan- 
 tage, with her charming eyes, and winning 
 smiles. Here she comes with Mrs. Selwyn, 
 who Avears a very magnificent dress, which 
 she intended to be I know not exactly what. 
 All I remember of it, indeed, is, that it was 
 excessively grand; and was surmounted by 
 that lady's very good-natured face, adorned 
 by a gold brocade turban and a bird of 
 paradise feather. I think I heard it said 
 that hers was the richest dress in the room.
 
 288 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 I pass over the jouiig gentlemen, — wliose 
 dresses were not worth looking at. I never 
 saw a man's dress at a fancy ball that was. 
 Strange figures thej look, be the costume what 
 it may. I thought those appeared to the 
 best advantage who had the least of the 
 fancy dress about them, — and the very best 
 of all looked Valentine. 
 
 His could scarcely be called a fancy dress ; 
 for, in fact, he had only thrown a blue domino 
 over him, which he cast off before he had 
 been a quarter of an hour in the ball-room. 
 Indeed, his was a dress many living, well 
 remember, and to many a by-gone belle it 
 may, with a melancholy sort of pleasure, 
 call to her recollection days when such were 
 worn by those who contested emulously her 
 hand for the next two country-dances. 
 
 He wore a blue coat with gilt buttons, and 
 a white waistcoat, one tie of ribbons was 
 hanging at the knees ; his silk stockings, which 
 displayed to advantage the handsomest figure 
 in the world, and a foot which might have 
 passed for a model, was set off to advantage
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 289 
 
 bj the black bows of ribbon which tied his 
 shoes. His hair, which was of a beautiful 
 sunny brown, waved and curled charmingly 
 over a face which was really delightful. Not 
 so much for its beauty, though he was unques- 
 tionably handsome, as for the gay sweetness 
 of its expression, and the sprightliness and 
 intelligence, and above all, most pleasant good 
 humour, which characterized it. 
 
 His figure was of the middle size, chiefly 
 remarkable for a certain ease of motion and 
 liveliness of gesture, which w^as excessively 
 agreeable ; united as it was to a certain air of 
 good taste and good breeding, which prevented 
 the slightest approach to boisterousness or 
 vulgarity. Altogetlier, a more agreeable 
 charming-looking young fellow than Valentine 
 Daubeney has rarely been seen ; and there was 
 something quite musical in the tone of that 
 merry laugh which might be heard ringing so 
 cheerfully from that part of the room where 
 he chanced to be. 
 
 Jn short, Valentine Daubeney was a uni- 
 versal favourite both with young and old. His 
 
 VOL. I. u
 
 290 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 politeness, and a certain nn affected deference 
 with which he treated the aged, particularly 
 aged ^yomen, rendered him peculiarly agreeable 
 to them : whilst the gravest and most serious 
 men, grown grey in the world's business, found 
 his sprightly remarks and clever sallies irre- 
 sistibly pleasant. 
 
 A man must have a good deal of cleverness 
 before he can possess such universal powers of 
 pleasing, and Valentine was certainly much 
 cleverer than he ever cared to profess, or was 
 generally thought to be. 
 
 One might have suspected, young scapegrace, 
 that he had something of the instinct of the 
 Monkeys, who will not show their parts, for fear 
 they should be made to work. Unfortunately, 
 Valentine hated work — seriousness — close 
 attention, and such like. He loved trifling — 
 he loved pleasure — ^he hated everything in the 
 form of work. To labour to acquire money 
 was his abhorrence ; but he loved dearly to 
 spend it, and he spent it but too lavishly. Yet 
 he was extravagant, careless, and idle, rather 
 than positively vicious ; for it was amusement
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 291 
 
 lie sousflit, not indiilsjence in yice. Had Valen- 
 tine been really a profligate, lie could never 
 have been so enfjasino" as he was. 
 
 Vice shows itself externally, some way or 
 other. A radically bad man may be fascinat- 
 ing, but he is never engaging. He may achieve 
 the conquest of some hearts, but he cannot be 
 universally pleasing, as was this young fellow. 
 Alas ! the pity that a little more solidity did 
 not lie at the base of a character compounded 
 of so many shining qualities ! 
 
 Valentine was kind-hearted, sweet-tempered, 
 generous, and affectionate ; he had a good un- 
 derstanding, abundance of common sense, lively 
 talents, and much knowledge of mankind. 
 
 But, alas ! for his want of solidity — for his 
 want of serious purpose — his want of tried 
 principles — his gay thoughtlessness — his easy 
 temper — his facility of being amused and in- 
 terested — his power of finding his happiness 
 in trifles — and his want of all earnestness of 
 spirit ! 
 
 He had been spoiled from the first by both 
 
 u 2
 
 292 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 
 
 father and motlier. Mr. and Mrs. Daubenej 
 had been to blame. 
 
 The father was a plain, straightforward, yet 
 an admirable man. He was devoted to business, 
 but with a soul far above his cash-book, and 
 tastes for a higher form of life, undeveloped, it 
 is true, but which found for themselves intense 
 gratification in the charming qualities which 
 Valentine from a mere child had displayed. 
 Mrs. Daubeney was a woman of good family ; 
 her manners were ladylike and well-bred. And 
 she too, as a matter of taste, rather than pride, 
 had doted upon the native elegance and re- 
 finement, the gay intelligence, and all the 
 charms displayed by her son while quite a 
 boy, so unlike the other boys of his age, as she 
 said ; and rightly enough, for Valentine was 
 not very like many other boys in the world. 
 
 The fond parents could deny him nothing. 
 The latter, because he loved them both dearly, 
 was never ashamed of his mercantile father, 
 even when surrounded by his most aristocratic 
 companions, — a virtue not always to be pre-
 
 TIME, THE AVEXGER. 293 
 
 dicated of city youths ; was tender, aifectionate, 
 polite, and attentive to his mother in every 
 way ; and though he spent a great deal more 
 money than was good for him, both at Harrow 
 and at Cambridge, never got into any dis- 
 graceful scrapes — was universally well spoken 
 of, and took his degree among the o'i polloi, 
 with what his father thought considerable 
 credit. 
 
 Though, if he had been asked where the 
 credit lay, it might have been hard for him to 
 have said. 
 
 After the college-life was ended, Valentine 
 had been rambling up and down in the world, 
 abroad and at home, for three or four years. 
 And now he was returned to an admiring 
 public, more accomplished and more polished 
 in his manners than ever ; but having lost 
 nothing of his delightful vivacity, his pleasant 
 facility, or the charming agreeableness of his 
 conversation. 
 
 I must confess to you I was as much taken 
 with him as the rest, as he came up the room 
 in that pleasant, easy, careless way of his, 
 
 VOL. I. u 3
 
 294 TIME, TBE AVEJTGEE. 
 
 talking with a group of joung fellows, who 
 snrroimdecl but could not eclipse him, he 
 shining among them " as a dove trooping 
 with crows," or any other comparison you 
 please. His merry laugh ringing from time to 
 time in my ears. I thought he was the most 
 charming young man I had seen for a very 
 long time, and I watched with unfeigned 
 pleasure his introduction to Miss Fleming, who 
 was beyond comparison the most beautiful girl 
 in the room. 
 
 And now he makes one of his light, plea- 
 sant bows, and accosts her in his most be- 
 witching manner, and the hand is held out, 
 and he leads her to the country-dance, and 
 places himself opposite to her — Soon it is their 
 turn, and away they go. 
 
 People used to know what dancing was in 
 those days, I assure you. 
 
 No very complicated figures had to be gone 
 through, indeed ; and no very artistical tunes 
 were played. 
 
 Hands across — down the middle — and up 
 again— poussette. To the tune of " Money 
 Musk.
 
 TIME, THE AYENGER. 295 
 
 The fiddles strike up, and they seem to fly. 
 
 He danced beautifully ; so did she. When 
 I say lie danced, I mean that he really did 
 dance. Lightly, gaily, and well, as dances 
 used to be danced. Young men were not 
 ashamed to dance in those days. 
 
 They all did steps. You may laugh if you 
 please, but there was a thing called setting, 
 which meant figuring away before your partner 
 with your best rigadons — for a given time. 
 Droll work some men made of it ; droll 
 work some women ; but they all did it with 
 their best. 
 
 It was perfectly beautiful to see this couple 
 dance ; they seemed both inspired. People 
 paused in their own dancing, stood back 
 and made way to look at them. And those 
 not engaged in the dance — the standers-by — 
 were almost ready to clap their hands and 
 applaud. 
 
 Did you ever hear or dance Money Musk 1 
 
 It is an inspiring sort of tune. 
 
 They floated away together, as if impelled 
 by one spirit ; like two nightingales singing
 
 296 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 bj moouliglit. There seemed to be a sweet con- 
 tention, which should excel amid a harmo- 
 nious unison. 
 
 They flew — They scarcely touched the 
 ground ! 
 
 People gathered from all sides of the room 
 to watch them. 
 
 Still they danced on. 
 
 They seemed to be, they were, utterly un- 
 aware of the sensation they were exciting. 
 They were absorbed in the delight of this 
 charming floating oneness of motion. The 
 sweet ease with which he bore, rather than led 
 her along — the enchanting facility with which 
 her light steps responded to his supporting 
 hand ! 
 
 It seemed as if like the hours. On so they 
 could have danced to eternity ; and spell-bound 
 the crowd would have looked on. 
 
 They were but mortal both, lovely beings 
 as they were, and of mortal things, the sweetest 
 and most dear, an end must come at last. 
 
 They came to the bottom of the dance, and 
 were forced to stop and sit down.
 
 TIME, THE AVENGER. 297 
 
 Slie was half-fainting when she did so, — 
 panting, and hardly able to recover her breath. 
 He led her to a seat near, and sat down, 
 fanning her and watching her. He had time 
 then to think that she was wondrouslj beau- 
 tiful, — to fall at once desperately in love. 
 
 In love he often was — in love he had often 
 professed to be before ; but this time he felt a 
 sensation quite new. He had been the tyrant 
 upon former occasions ; he felt himself now, 
 and for ever, a slave. 
 
 That was a fascinating look of admiration 
 and tenderness w^hicli she met when she lifted 
 up her eyes. Never countenance expressed 
 tenderness like his — never voice spoke such 
 sweet music to a young girl's ear. 
 
 And when she was a little recovered, he 
 began to talk to her in such a delightful way 
 as she thought. 
 
 I don't know much what he said. It was 
 not very solid matter that he handled, you 
 may be sure ; but he had a way of making 
 every subject pleasing and enticing, by his 
 clever, lively way of rattHng about it. Lilla
 
 298 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 at least tliouglit never was conversation so 
 agreeable. Thej both behaved very ill. It 
 was a species of ill-behaviour, but too common 
 in those days when partners were pleased with 
 each other. They were apt to forget the duty 
 of taking their turn and walking up the dance 
 they had so triumphantly danced down. 
 
 These two offended sadly at this time. 
 They were lost in each other's conversation. 
 
 How dehghtful it was to Miss Fleming, 
 after her long abstinence from pleasant society, 
 to meet with this engaging young man ! AVhat 
 a contrast to Mr. Oraiglethorpe ! — Dry, sar- 
 castic, harsh, unkind, mortifying Mr. Oraigle- 
 thorpe. This sweet, winning, good-humour of 
 Valentine — that half-expressed, half-implied 
 admiration — those glances of tender devotion, 
 which now and then seemed to escape from 
 the gay, sweet eyes. 
 
 The very modulation of his voice was har- 
 mony, and contrasted strangely with the tones 
 which had so recently met her ear from 
 another. 
 
 She felt impelled to love this amiable being.
 
 TIME, THE AYEXGER. 299 
 
 Charmed, delighted, she could not but be. 
 She could not help loving him. And yet . . . 
 
 There is a fascination — an inexplicable 
 fascination — which some characters exercise 
 over others. We can liken it only to the 
 hacknied similitude of the viper fascinating a 
 delicate little winged bird. And that fasci- 
 nation, Valentine, after all, as regarded Lilla 
 Fleming, did not possess. She might love 
 him as the winged warbler loves his mate ; but 
 she was ready to perish rather than escape 
 from the other's fearful power. 
 
 But I forestall. 
 
 I intended to give jou a specimen of their 
 conversation. But how shall I collect the 
 fleeting colours of the rainbow, or weave a 
 web of the gossamer that glitters in a summer- 
 day sun '? Enough, when they parted, when 
 he conducted her to Mrs. Selwyn's carriage, 
 and bowing those pretty curls of his, bade her 
 good night, as he gently pressed her hand, — 
 they both felt as they had never felt before. 
 
 He, that he had found at last the true mis- 
 tress of his soul — she, the deliverer of hers.
 
 300 TIME, THE AVENGER. 
 
 The charm seemed to be broken. She felt 
 free — free to wing her happj flight in the air. 
 The cruel magic of the serpent's eye no longer 
 seemed to rivet her to the spot. The bondage 
 was at an end; her fetters were unloosed; she 
 had found her mate — one congenial — one her 
 equal and companion. She breathed freelj 
 again ! 
 
 Was it so 1 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON : PRINTED BY HARRISON AND SON, ST. MAETIN S LANE. 
 
 ^ /