a I E> R.ARY OF THE U N IVLRSITY Of ILLINOIS T252 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/tendringcottageo01lond TENDRING COTTAGE OR THE RAINBOW AT NIGHT. BY THE AUTHOR OF "SIN AND SORROW." " I am satisfied with, and stand fast as a rock on the belief that all that happens in God's world, happens for the best; but what in that world is merely germ, what blossom, what fruit, I know not." The Destination of Man — J. G. Fichte. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 1853. 8£3 v. a PREFACE. Sir Humphrey Davy thus explains the proverb, " The rainbow at night Is the shepherd's delight : The rainbow at morning Is the shepherd's warning." " The rainbow is never visible but in the clouds opposite the sun. Now, as the pre- valent winds are westerly, those gathered in the eastern sky at sunset have generally passed over our heads, and the night-guard may hope for fair weather. " So man, in the evening of his day, may look at the dark cloud that hum? on his iv PREFACE. life's course, winging away to be no more seen; and on it he may read bright things, lessons of wisdom, courage, patience, and hope — learnt while he walked under its shadow." TENDRING COTTAGE: OB, THE RAINBOW AT NIGHT. CHAPTER I. Tendring Cottage stood on a rock on the sea-shore; the cliffs towered above and the wide downs stretched all around. The sea had made great inroads on the coast since this cottage was built ; formerly there was a garden between the cottage and the sea. Bul- warks had been raised to oppose the en- croaching enemy, but they had been buried or torn away, and the sea broke with mock- ing fury over them, and hammered with giant strokes against the base of those lofty rocks. Every spring-tide, when the wind was on shore, washed away some VOL. I. B 2 TENDRING COTTAGE. shattered fragments : and soon it was thought that those proud cliffs would be brought down, and the advancing tide play through the ruins of Tendring Cottage. The flight of steps which led from the door to the beach had already been broken by the waves. The building was very pretty; but being held as doomed to a watery grave, it was seldom repaired. The stone of which it was built and the tiles which roofed it were covered with lichens and moss, and on the sheltered side the mullions and heavy chimneys were covered with ivy. Behind there was a large court and garden filled with flowers and shrubs. A small pier was built near the cottage, where the coasting vessels anchored, and received and discharged their cargoes. It was indeed a sailor's home; a few paces brought him from his frail and storm-tossed vessel, to the quiet, secure shelter of his own roof. How often have the owners with aching hearts watched, as the sea fog crept over TENDRING COTTAGE. 3 and hid the far horizon — how often have they anxiously waited for day's dawn, to see the well-known sail? How often, in the dark tempest, has the eye of tender love wandered over the pathless waters, hoping that the lightning's lantern would reveal the course of the little bark, for whose safety such hearty prayers were proffered? How often, too, has the home- bound craft been seen from afar, and love's assiduous hand prepared the warm welcome ? So, too, has the sailor-boy looked to the lights in those windows, when he first left his home, and with tearful eyes he has sent tender thoughts to her who was sitting by that glimmering light, trembling for him on the treacherous waves. How often has he greeted that signal when the broad dark waters were round him, and no other light but the one burning in the casement of his home. To him it had then a message to tell that " all teas ivell" Many years have passed since the period B 2 4 TENDMNG COTTAGE. of which we write; the walls of Tendring Cottage have fallen, the sea birds perch on its broken ruins, the waves have forced their way through to the garden and torn up the sweet flowers. Once they had a tenant, and it seemed when they had nourished, sheltered, and mourned her, that the mission was done ; and henceforth all should moulder and perish, as a fair corpse when the life- giving spirit has flown. Henceforth it was but a tale — the place knew her no more;, her home lay buried by the deep sea, her- self in the land for which she was nurtured among these beetling cliffs — for " she could not be here alway." " Dear mother, do not sit and watch any longer;, it wears you and tires you. I have been up on the cliff and looked all round; there is not a sail in sight. It is. now getting dark, and the tide is going out r so no vessel can come in to-night; we must wait for to-morrow •" " But it was to-night they promised to. be honie r " replied her mother, " and the TENDRING COTTAGE. 5 wind is fair. Oh, it is sad work, watching and waiting !" and she stood leaning against the window, looking over the wide expanse of water. It was growing dark, there was no light on the sea, and the curtain of night was falling, and nothing could be seen but the white edge of the waves that beat gently on the shore. "Watch no more; let me help you to bed. You are weak; rest, and they will come in with the morning tide." " Morning tide!" she repeated; " there is also a tide of life which ebbs fast. Would to God he were come home!" Her daughter helped her to an easy chair, and sat down by her side. The house clock hung near, and its drowsy pendulum vibrated, and the crickets on the hearth were busy in the silence. Mary looked out again; "There is no wind to-night, so there is no danger; that is a comfort for us." " How can you talk of comfort, or of there being no danger? Can you ever forget how 6 TENDRING COTTAGE. many are buried there in those treacherous seas? Mary, count them well, and never be a sailor's wife. Father and grandfather, uncle, brother ! I was sitting as I am now, rocking your cradle. I got up and looked at the stars, and thought how bright all appeared, and that there was no danger. I had no fear, and I laid you down in my bed. I should have slept, but whenever I closed my eyes, I saw your father sitting in his boat and smiling on me. Ah, I was frightened, I saw him so often. But, Mary, I have told you all that a hundred times." " Yes, very often," she replied; " too often; for it makes you sad." " No, no ; not for myself. It is all so strangely clear to-night, that perhaps Mary, I cannot die happy if I think you are to live as I have lived, that your youth is to pass as mine ; your days and nights in watching the changing winds and listening to their moans ; and then in such grief that I heard nothing that passed — Oh, Mary, I was very wicked; for when he was gone, I TENDRING COTTAGE. 7 did not care who was lost in the storm, it might have torn away the whole world; — when I used to sit and watch the rain pouring down without, and my tears wetting the panes within — he always told me, what all sailors say, that he was as safe there as here; and so he said when I carried down the little lamp the last time. He sent me back to fetch his Bible, but I sent it down by your poor brother ; and I sat down there and watched him, for I could not go back; and when the boat went round the point, I cried till my heart almost broke. But you know it all — it seems like yesterday." " Dear mother, you must not talk so. Listen to me, and I will tell you of other things. You will not get well if you think so much of my father." " Mary," she answered, " I am sure I am going to him ; and how can I die and leave you alone?" a You were left alone with children to take care of, and you have never wanted." "Never wanted!" she replied; "God 8 TENDRING COTTAGE. grant that you may never want as I have done. I have wanted him by night and by day ; I have wanted him in health and in sickness; I wanted him in youth, and now I want him to close my eyes." " Dear mother," said her daughter, " pray speak no more. But surely when death does come, you will then be glad he is gone. Surely you think of meeting him there, where there will be no more storms and fears. But," going up to her mother, and kneeling by her, she said, " but go now. and rest and sleep, for you are ill and tired." " Go rather and look out once more, and bid them hurry on," and Mary went to the window. " All is dark, dear mother ; some stars are shining, but there are no lights on the sea." As they spoke a knock at the outer gate announced a visitor; it was, however, but a messenger from the neighbouring place, Tendring Hall, to know whether Mary's brother was at home, and could take a TENDRIXG COTTAGE. V large party out on the following day in his beautiful cutter; they wanted to go on board the revenue cruiser at anchor near. But Mrs. Johnson could not tell them when her son would return, for neither he nor his vessel were at their wonted places. She could only promise that directly he came home the family at the Hall should hear. Morning came, and brought no tidings of William Johnson, his companions, or his vessel, but it found his mother with in- creased debility, restless and suffering. Her large chair was placed in the bay window, which almost overhung the cliff; from thence her eye could travel over the waste of waters which she had for so many years scanned with an eagle eye. A little porch opened on the sea-leading steps, and the invalid tottered out once more to look around. The young ladies eager for their boating party arrived, and stood there, and looked, and wondered. Mrs. Johnson shook her head, and Mary looked pale and thoughtful, without ex- b3 20 TENDRING COTTAGE. pressing any defined fear, except for her mother's health. It was a beautiful summer's day, when the glassy, tranquil ocean speaks not a word to tell what it is when lashed into fury by the pursuing storm — when its placid bosom denies all danger, and when one is tempted to say — " None is so blest as a mariner's life, stealing over those bright seas, borne along without toil or effort by those snowy sails through the pathless waters." But Mrs. Johnson never looked at them but as the grave of all she loved, and no hour of beauty ever made them change their gloomy aspect in her eyes; and she sat there, and her daughter by her side. Sometimes a neigh- bour passed and asked after the absent ones, and went on, and so the day wore away, Mrs. Johnson full of thoughts she dared not tell, and Mary full of fears she dared not avow. We must, however, tell more of the poor sufferer sitting there, that our readers, hearing her tale, may know how to feel for TENDRING COTTAGE. 11 her iii an hour when fresh trouble seems abroad. Mrs. Johnson's father was the youngest son of a gentleman of good family, and though in straitened circumstances, had bestowed much care on his daughter's edu- cation. He died, and her wayward cha- racter induced her to make a marriage which he would hardly have sanctioned. Her choice, however, was justified by the great excellence of the man she married. He was one of those rare specimens now and then permitted to appear among men to give courage to those who are toiling in life's way, and to remind us of man's capa- bilities, and as examples of his high desti- nation. It seemed as if the perfection for which we must stirve was sketched out in some chosen models. Johnson was one of these. He was one, who, if a woman once loved, need never fear a rival. His heroism, his benevolence, his truth and purity, his honour and integrity, must have enshrined him where no other could follow to share 12 TENDMNG COTTAGE. the worship. We must, however, pass hiin by, to see his virtues reappear in the cha- racter of his daughter; and we will say no more of him, than that his wife considered herself, and justly, as the most blest of women on the morning wdien he brought her to his rock-seated home. His boats lay moored near, and all the vessels of his friends and neighbours were, like his own, decked with flags and colours, in honour of his bride. She alwavs dwelt on those hours — she was sure that never sun had set as that sun had done — it tra- velled to the west in a chariot of clouds so dazzlingly bright, and as it descended sent forth a flood of glorious light, like a shower of gold, and then set in unveiled beauty. Oh, what bright, what delusive hopes she built on that hour. She told, too, that when all that burnished sea became dark, that he opened the book, that book which was his guide and his staff; and the words he spoke abode with her, and the hour was TENDRING COTTAGE. 13 ever recalled with a feeling of awe and regret. His wife was less pious, less gentle than her husband ; she had strong passions and a strong will, and it was her love for her husband that made her submit to control. She never yielded to any direct guidance, but her intense affection for her husband gave him power over her, and he checked and ruled her. One catastrophe robbed her of her hus- band and his brother and her eldest boy, and she was left alone on the stream of life to struggle on with her broken heart. Grief did for her what it does for so many, deve- loped the good and the evil within — the high and beneficent intent of sorrow wrestling with an antagonistic power — the one seeking to plant precious fruit in the bleeding heart, the other sowing baneful and noxious weeds. So witli this widow ; sometimes she seemed to have learned holy lessons, and was submissive and content ; at other times, her character was more rebel- 14 TENDRING COTTAGE. lious, her will more turbulent, her heart more hard than before the desolating strokes that had fallen on her. Time had not done its wont for her ; she seemed as sensitive to her loss as in her youth — the wounds never healed. Still she would sometimes read where he had bade her. Sometimes her fitful nature clung to the comforts of religion; at first, it was in hope of pleasing him; afterwards, the widow's friend met her on his own chosen ground, and taught her with all her wilfulness to call him her Father and her God. She had one son, who followed his father's calling, and had shares in many vessels, and commanded one that he owned. He had, how- ever, lately remained near home, making short runs in a beautiful cutter. She out- sailed everything that had ever tried speed with her, and was thought the queen of those seas: could he ever regret that he owned this prize? Alas! but he was not the first who had turned advantage to misfortune. But the child who inherited her father's TENDRING COTTAGE. 15 beauties and virtues, is the one who is now sitting and watching by her dying parent. Her father died when she was too young to feel his loss, but her mother had brought her up to mourn her father. She checked her earliest smile, reproved her joyous laugh, and the little thing used to sit and watch her mother, and look grave and sad before she knew or could understand that her mother was resolved to stamp on her whole character and manner the type of a fatherless child. She understood her not, but felt early that she had a grief to deal with — it was an element in her childhood's life. Her mother dreaded that she would forget that she was a bereaved child, and she sat for hours on those stairs by which he left her, telling, as their years would bear the story, of all her grief. Perhaps all this strange discipline had brightened Mary's character, for her earliest lesson was a total self-sacrifice. If she could not always weep with her mother, her first words often were — " I will not play, 16 TENDRING COTTAGE. because she is crying." It seemed almost the motto of her life, for her youthful joys had been all suppressed — her gaieties all checked, because her mother was in grief. When she and her brother played, their play-ground was always chosen where she could not hear. Sometimes the poor widow seemed sensible of the wrongs she did her children ; but then, again, she taught them that their calling was to be serious. As years passed away, the oft-told history of her mother's griefs produced different feel- ings on her child. That love for their lost father was at first sacred and mysterious — a woman's love to her husband is as an un- known rite to the child — a sort of holy mystery, an affection quite apart from any that the child's heart can recognise. But as the child reaches on towards womanhood, she looks at her suffering, widowed mother with an altered eye — she begins to read the unknown tongue. It was so with Mary. As she looked forward to the future with its flowers of promise, and as her heart TENDRING COTTAGE. 17 sketched out the land of love to which she aspired, she turned to her sorrowing mother with a deeper interest, and with something like sympathy. That opening soul dwelt profoundly on her mother's lot, as the tender creeper might look on her sister plant robbed of all support, unable to rise, and trailing on earth in confused growth ; as one winding her way to green pastures and still waters, would look on the wanderer on barren heaths and wastes. Sometimes, in deep thought, she would sit and listen to her tale of widowed love, then suddenly she would throw her arms around her, and weep angel tears for her griefs. Her mother then would, with strange perversity, disdain all sympathy, for no child ignorant of life as she was could know anything of the grief she pitied. And so Mary was shut up to converse with her own wonderful spirit, where nature spoke in all its purity and fire. She was in life a model, and every duty was scrupulously fulfilled, and every- thing around her bore the marks of her 18 TENDRING COTTAGE. gifted mind, her taste, her diligence; and sometimes the complaining parent would allow that joy might be hers in the posses- sion of such a child. For some weeks Mrs. Johnson's health had been declining, and her weakness in- creased rapidly, and it became evident to all that the cords were loosening. To return to the time when our story opens. " Do not sit longer there; let me lead you to your bed, dear mother," said her child. u What a noise those curlews make," re- plied her fretful mother. " There are all sorts of pleasant sounds to-day," said Mary; " and the tide is so far out that we can hear all the birds sing; for you know how often we scold those waves that they drown their sweet songs." " Sweet songs, Mary ! I tell you that they are all birds of evil omen ; they all sat there on that day, and they are never wanting when trouble is at hand." TENDRING COTTAGE. 19 " And at all other times, too, mother, for they gather regularly on those points." " Yes, yes," said Mrs. Johnson; "I told him on that day that there were five in a row, and that that was just the number of letters in death : so he stopped at the foot of those steps, and said : ' Then, Mary, I will come and commit you again to God's care, and then death will be welcome; mean- while, you are in a father's care.' ' Non- sense,' I replied, ' don't talk of that, I want no care but yours ;' and he bade me say it no more. l You will be punished,' he said, 'for such wicked words. Meanwhile, I thank God that I leave you and my sweet baby and child in his hands ; and you will be their father and mother while I am away ;' " and the poor invalid cried bitterly. ft It is too late now — too late. I have not done what he willed ; and now I must leave you — leave you, and all alone, Mary, for I see no one coming;" and through her tears she looked up once more over the wide seas. No one came, and the trembling girl laid 20 TENDRING COTTAGE. her mother on her bed. Night came, the bats and owls hovered and hooted, as was their wont, and the dogs bayed and howled. They made melancholy music — " nothing but songs of death.'' The widow trembled, and then she wept, and then she smiled; but her strength gradually failed, and though now and again she would send Mary to the window to look out, yet her thoughts seemed drawing in from all ex- ternal life. The approach of death is deadening; as if the heartstrings, which fastened round the objects in life, were broken, the spirit seems to be shaking loose and concentrating on itself as it goes forth alone into the dark valley. " Mary," she said, after a long silence, " I feel my voyage is nearly over : you know your father always said life was like one ; do you think I shall go into harbour with him?" '- Let me read," she replied, " the hymn we sung at church last Sunday, beginning, TENDRING COTTAGE. 21 1 There is a land of pure delight,' and ending — ' Death, like a narrow sea, divides That heavenly land from ours.' " " It is narrow and soon crossed," she replied : " how soon he crossed it I" Her daughter looked at her, and started ; till that moment her heart was with the absent crew; but now she saw the strange expression, the altered hues, and throwing herself on her knees, she exclaimed — " Can this be death?" but she did not know, or would not see his ghostly work on the loved face. " No, no, dear mother," she said, em- bracing her, " you will not leave me." " Yes, Mary, all alone;" and she wound her feeble arms around her weeping child. " But not alone," she replied, wiping away the tears. " Yes, Mary, I know; who knows better who is the widow's friend?" " Then rest and sleep, dearest mother; do not fear." 22 TENDRING COTTAGE. " Yes, yes, Mary ; rest is near. I see him — I hear him:" and she raised her hands and clasped them with a look of radiant joy. After a time, she turned and looked again at her child. " Alone, in this hard world ! No, I cannot, I cannot leave you — but he calls me. I must go — do not fear, we will keep always near you." But Mary could only sob; then rousing herself, with trembling yoice, she sought once more to commune with the parting spirit, but she received no answer. "Who will comfort you?" her mother whispered, and her lips moved, as if the burden of her orphan child lay on her parting spirit ; but she no longer could ex- change a thought with mortals, and lay there while death gently chilled the pulse of life; all was silent in that chamber. Mary and her solitary attendant knelt by the couch, and soon the " shrieking owl awak- ened the crowing cock :" it was the " fatal bellman," and Mary was an orphan. Bitter was that hour: her warm tears TENDRING COTTAGE. 23 Lathed the deserted tabernacle. In the depth of her grief she forgot her own deso- late position, her absent brother; every- thing was absorbed in the one overwhelming catastrophe — her mother was dead, and she sat looking at the still remains, as he only knows who has gazed at the loved dead. She opened the door and looked out over the sea, but no one was there with help for her; all was so silent; the morning exhala- tion veiled the horizon, and like a curtain hid the distance. There was no living thing but two tall herons, which were perched on a little rock, waiting for the fish that the advancing tide should bring to them. She then went and looked into her garden : the morning dew hung on the flowers, sparkling in the sun like diamonds, but no human voice was heard, or form was seen. The little gold-crested wren, whose nest was built in the yew hedge, was up and chirping, looking for the early worm; and on the wall a host of choristers from the neighbouring copse were singing, and 24 TENDRING COTTAGE. from the yellow furze on the common, which contained many of their nests. Poor Mary's heart turned from the bright scene : once she had thought that no one could feel poor, none sorrowful, in face of a smiling, bounteous nature. Her simple heart had felt there was a sort of shadowing forth, in those seen things, of the infinity, the boundlessness, and perfection of the unseen. They had always spoken to her as if they were forerunners, harbingers of that which should follow. But that morning, even the hum of the bee hovering over her mother's cherished hives brought fresh tears to her eye, fresh grief to her heart. But she had from a child sought and found that there was a hand that dried the mourner's tears. Before her birth her father had arranged the room for her mother to occupy : he had procured for his young wife all the elegance and comfort his circumstances permitted, and his sorrowing widow had so sacredly preserved his work, that as she lay there all TENDRING COTTAGE. 25 seemed exactly as she had left it. She was stretched on the bed she had never vacated ; the pillow on which his head for the last time had rested had never been removed ; the table, with its wide-spread Bible, as he placed it; and the white curtain he had festooned across that window was now drawn across, to show that the inmate was sleeping her eternal sleep. Whatever rough hands might have been employed in other parts of the house, none but her own was ever allowed to touch this holy place; she kept it as a sort of shrine or temple. Mary did not forget her mother's feeling, and she herself arranged the bed and room with exquisite neatness. . Though the damp sea air had tarnished all else, in this room all was bright and clean as the day it was first furnished. We said that a heavy mist or fog hung over the sea, and though the sorrowing orphan looked constantly out for her absent brother, she could not see far; and there was a dead calm: about twelve o'clock, VOL. I. c 26 TENDRING COTTAGE. however, the sunbeams dispersed the cloud, and she saw her brother's boat, with the sails hanging round the mast, sitting qui- escently on the waves, reflected beneath on the calm surface; she hailed it with joy, and wished she could hang out a signal of distress, to warn him that grief awaited him on his landing. " He cannot see the curtain is down; how shall I tell him?" As she watched the boat, she observed that a smaller one was hanging to the stern, into which a man jumped, and impetuously pulled towards shore : he sprung out of the boat, and landed close to the wooden steps of the cottage. Mary ran to hide herself in the house, not daring to tell what had happened. She heard his hurried tread and impatient questions ; but the poor nurse only answered with her tears. " Who told you?" he said, angrily, to her. " Your poor mother," she replied, sobbing. " Well," he answered, " I must be off ; tell her all may be well; but I must not TENDRING COTTAGE. 27 lose a minute. I will just kiss her and Mary;" and his hand was on the door of the sacred chamber. " Stop, stop!" cried the old nurse. " Miss Mary is not there." " Not there — where, then T and he went to the door of the court and tore it open ; on the steps sat Mary, her head resting on her knees. He flew to her, put his arm round her, and said, " Good-bye, my love. I have not a moment — tell her I am safe, and shall soon be home, but I must go now." " Go !" she exclaimed, lifting up her tearful eyes. " It's not so bad as they say, love, so don't mind ; comfort mother, and I will soon be back." " Oh!" she said, screaming; "what can you mean ? No one but God can now comfort her." "It's too true," he answered; " but do your best, and let no one come here in my absence to tease and torment you with false tales." c 2 28 TENDRING COTTAGE. " William, what is it — has grief mack you mad? It has me, almost." He drew out his watch. " Mary," he said, " if I don't get away with this tide, all is lost — God knows what may happen. I have only ten minutes, and that is hardly safe. Let us go and console mother — what did they tell her?" " Nobody came near her," said Mary ; " I was all alone. Oh, William, how I looked for you, and prayed for you to come back." He turned to the door. She put her arm in his, and said, " Oh, William, tread gently." " Is she ill, then?" he said; " I thought it would kill her." "It did, William," she exclaimed; and fell into his arms. Clasping her, and dragging her along with him, he crossed the threshold and was hurrying on, when she whispered — "Not yet, not yet; stop but one instant." " Then, tell me," he answered, " who called to tell her what had happened?" TENDRING COTTAGE. 29 " No one came here but God's messenger; the angel of death came, William, and she is gone with him.'' Hiding her face on her brother's shoulder, the poor girl could say no more. He threw her from him, and rushing into the house, thrust open the door, tore away the curtain, and saw the cold remains of his mother. When Mary fol- lowed him, she found him senseless on the floor: she chafed, she rubbed, she bathed his temples with her tears; and he was recovering his consciousness, when a sailor's footsteps wereheard approaching :he knocked at the cliff door — " Master, we have but five minutes; we shall hardly get off." " I can't come," he said, faintly; " tell him, Mary, I can't." She went to the door. " No wonder you cry," said the man ; " but it wont do no good; it will be worse if he don't make haste. God take care of you and the old lady." She ran back to her brother, who had risen from the floor, and was bending and crying over his mother's corpse. 30 TENDRING COTTAGE. "He wont go, William; I don't under- stand him." " Tell him, I don't care; I shan't go." She repeated the words, and the rough man pushed by her into the room. He stood and looked, the tear started in his eye, and stole down his weather-beaten cheek, and he did not speak for a minute. Then going up to William, who had never noticed him, he touched him; he looked round wildly at him, and his old pilot whis- pered, " Mr. William, it's little you can do for the dead, but save the living, and come back to the '• Sailor's Pearl ;' and the Blessed Virgin keep her till then !" "Why must he go?" said Mary; "he must stay here. I cannot let him." " Then he and others may rot in prison," answered the man. Mary looked at her brother, whose head was on the pillow beside his mother; but he made no answer. The boatman then pulled hold of him, and said, " You haven't half the courage of your sister ; don't be like TENDRING COTTAGE. 3i a weak woman : leave the dead, and save the living. Mr. Meldon will think you are lost, and don't mind to save him." At this name Mary lifted up her eye, and for the first time seemed conscious that something had happened. Seeing that she knew nothing of the circumstances to which he referred, William looked up, caught hold of his sister's hand, and said, " Did she never hear?" "Hear what?" said Mary. " Then I did not kill her," he said, his face brightening. " I will go;" and wiping away his manly tears, he rose up, enfolded his sister with warm affection, and went to the door, where the nurse stopped him — 4t Mister William, you don't suppose that poor thing knows how to do everything decent, and right for her mother's burial ; you can't go this way, and leave her." " I tell you, I must; but I shall be home." Putting some money into her hands, he said, " Don't let anybody come and frighten her with foolish stories ; send for the clergyman, 32 TENDRING COTTAGE. and my uncle." And hardly able to hold up his head, he pushed by her. Mary stood on the beach, and saw the sturdy boatman pulling hard, while her brother, who seldom sat idle in his boat, threw himself down in the stern of his boat, and hid his face in his hands. She could not understand what this sudden retreat meant. She had not time to ask him ; his words and manner were quite enigmatical to her. She was stupified by the whole scene. She ran down to the pier with him, sobbing, but he could not speak ; and she saw him go, with- out knowing what had happened to take him away so suddenly at such a moment: and she turned back, and went into the cottage in greater distress than before. The nurse saw and felt for her position, and hastened to obey her brother's direc- tion ; she went to her uncle, and then to the parsonage, to inform the clergyman of Mary's loss and lonely situation. TENDRING COTTAGE. 33 CHAPTER II. No beauty had ever attracted more admi- ration than Mary Johnson. From a child she had been regarded with peculiar inte- rest ; few, indeed, perhaps not one, discerned the hidden treasure deposited in that beau- tiful form, but all seemed to feel that there was something peculiar about the child. All this undefined promise seemed verified by her exemplary conduct, which was itself only a promise of the life yet to be de- - veloped. Who was so modest, so dutiful, so indus- trious, yet who so gentle, so compassionate with the suffering? She was a rare ex- ample of the union of power and capability for lofty enterprise with the care and detail so essential to her narrow circle; and the poor women who blest her for her care wished she was a queen ; and those who c3 34 TENDRING COTTAGE. watched her in her walled garden wished she had a kingdom for her inheritance ; and those who saw her tears for the suffering said she had humanity enough to weep for a nation's sorrow. It was indeed one of those rare spirits seldom launched on this lower world, and whose course, when it does appear, must be followed with grief and admiration, for round such, clouds often gather, lightnings shiver, and the furnace seems heated for them — for they are gold worth refining, jewels worth polishing — and as they cross the orbit of this earth all seems hurled at them, that every speck may be destroyed, and so they may enter pure and perfect on their distant course, when they have darted away beyond time's nar- row limits to shine in realms of pure day. But Mary's youth was serene and full of promise. Not only the young sought to win her love, there was not a father whose arms were not open to receive her as a child, if she would but accept his son's proffered hand. But she was her mother's TENDRING COTTAGE. 35 constant attendant, never seen in any great assemblage of people. Her mind Lad been made thoughtful from the cradle ; her mother was a perpetual mourner, and that seemed to throw a veil of seriousness over her gaiety, for her flow of youthful joy had often been checked by recalling to her memory her fatherless condition ; as a child she would run up to her mother with her garland of wild flowers, while her mother's eye was fixed on the broad waters, beneath whose flood he slept, and then looking up and seeing how the tears trickled down, she would throw away her gift, and bury her face on her mother's lap and weep with her. That divine sympathy was hers from a child. But many of these virtues might have been dormant and undeveloped, if she had not been put in contact with those who helped to break away the shell and let the mind free. It was a strange coincidence that threw her into the society^of one who opened the doors of her soul. He did not go in 36 TENDRING COTTAGE. and dwell there, but he helped her to form such a temple as was fit for noble -wor- ship, and so apparently unsuited to the work, for he was but a Manchester weaver ; his childhood passed in a manufactory. His father before him had lived the same life — a whole race, born, educated, lived, and died among spinning wheels and steam engines. It was the earliest music young Thornbridge had heard. He had passed through all the stages of his trade, from where the infant hand sufficed, to where the most skilful and practised workman was needed. In every department he was dis- tinguished for his excellent work, and he might have secured himself competency, if not riches, in his calling. But he could not endure the monotony, the noise, the heat of the factory. He looked at the great shaft of the steam engine that never rested, at those wheels in con- stant motion, with a sort of nervous dread, as if the ceaseless din, the everlasting move- ment, would drive him mad; and then he TENDRIXG COTTAGE. 37 looked out of the window, near which his daily task chained him, and from which he could see the distant hill above the wilder- ness of chimneys; and whenever his eye rested on it, he felt inclined to worship it; but the wheel could not be stopped, and he worked on, thinking of the blue mountains, the rivers and fields and trees, and he made many a vow that lie would some day be among them, far from the turmoil of his daily work. On Sundays he walked far away into the country, and often, stretched beneath some spreading tree, he would kiss the earth, and promise that one day he would come and spend the rest of his days in adoring God and Nature. But Monday morning found him again within sound of the grating engine, in densely-peopled rooms and streets. But here was his daily bread ; if he forsook his work he could not exist; so he often said to himself — u To exist I must cease to live." Whether it were this earnest desire to be free which exhausted his strength, or 38 TENDRING COTTAGE. whether it were the real need of his nature shown in these deep longings, it is hard to say ; but after years of patient work, hoping that his prison door might be opened, his health began to fail, and the doctor came to break away his chains and bid him be free. An early death could not terrify him, if his spirit might go under a bright sky, amidst sparkling brooks and singing birds. His first day, when he was forbidden to go to the manufactory, was spent far away from the town, and he returned at night to his father's roof with large bundles of flowers, as trophies of his new home, like the olive leaves on the dove's return to the ark. For some weeks he remained with his parents. It was hoped that rest and healthy exercise would restore him; but after the first effect of the change had passed away, he began to sink into his former condition of languor and weakness. Long and skilful industry had enabled his father to provide against old age or misfortune, and he was TENDRING COTTAGE. 39 therefore able to comply with his medical adviser's wishes, and send his son to the sea-side. Having friends in the town near which Mary lived, it was chosen as the most agreeable retreat for young Thornbridge. His departure, and the malady which made it necessary, gave his friends and family much sorrow. His own fire-side lost its best ornament ; his sisters their tenderest friend ; his parents their most dutiful child ; his club its most distinguished member; and his minister his most intelligent listener. There was such an air of sadness about him now when he was about to realize his fond dreams, that made many fear that he had sad forebodings for the future. Among the causes for depression in this young man was the misery of the people with whom he came in constant contact. His father and his father's father had always been skilful, sober, and industrious workmen. They had always earned high wages, and were in constant employ ; every year they had added to their accumulated savings and comforts, 40 TENDMNG COTTAGE. but others, who had started in the same race, working under the same roof, at the same trade, were not so prosperous — drunk- enness, carelessness, profligacy in many cases, and illness and misfortune in some others, had brought poverty among them — and his heart was sick within him when he followed some of these poor people to their homes. A more matured mind, or greater experience, would have taught him where to look for the immediate cause of all the want and misery which he witnessed. But lie, in the plenitude of his benevolence, could not bear to blame the people whom he wished simply to pity, and he therefore loaded con- demnation on those who were in that case no way guilty, and often, when his heart was bleeding at the mass of human suffering and destitution, he would join in the outcry against the rich which he heard raised bv the less humane and virtuous members of his club. When the coach had surmounted the last hill that lay between him and the town of TENDRING COTTAGE. 41 . , he for the first time saw the sea. He felt at that moment as if he had realized his existence — as if a new world and a new life opened upon him. He left his convey- ance, and sitting down by the side of a small wood of stunted wind-scathed copse, he watched the evening sun as it nearecl its watery barrier. Never was enchantment more complete. He looked over the wide- spread ocean; on its bosom was reflected every tint of the gorgeous colouring of the sky above. It seemed without a boundary or a limit; as if the infinity to which he aspired, and the eternity for which he hoped, was there typified. It awoke in him the most earnest longings after an unseen good, and he fell on his knees to worship the God and Author of all. It seemed to him as if heaven had opened, and revealed itself to his adoring eye. He became more and more conscious that there was a spirit abroad which spoke to his own, that he was united* in some way with this fair world, that such scenes as he now dwelt on were not idle 42 TENDRIXG COTTACxE. and passing pageants, but shadowing im- perishable truth. Oh, it was neither to be told nor conceived what he felt on that even- ing ; nor was its effect ephemeral, for long after he recalled that hour as one in which good tidings of peace and love had been brought to his soul. Impatient to reach the beach, he crossed the unenclosed down that lay between the road and the shore. By the light of the evening sun, with its long shadows and warm colure, everything looked beautiful. He sprang down from rock to rock, till the waves actually broke at his feet. The summer's sea gave him a gentle greeting; and he thought he could have passed his life in watching its ebbing and flowing, as it bathed the sides of the little bay where he stood. The sun was now resting on the horizon, descending as a splendid orb of gold with a bright pillar whose base seemed >at his feet. Vessels seemed becalmed in the stream of light. He watched with eager eyes, astonished and entranced, but TENDRING COTTAGE. 43 in a few minutes all was gone, and the sudden change seemed only to give him new delight, for he sat down that he might see the stars light over the new scene. He thought he could never tear himself away, but he remembered his waiting, anxious friends, and having with some difficulty remounted the cliff he had descended with such alacrity, he found himself in a lonely path in the deep twilight. It was but a sheep-walk, and he felt uncertain which way would lead to his destined home. As he stood to find his bearings, Mary came down the hill. He went up to her, and asked his way to the town of K . She readily guided him, and told him where he must regain the road he had forsaken. He was indeed well disposed to receive charmful impressions, and there was some- thing in Mary's aspect and manner that harmonized with his feelings, and he said to himself, " Here is a flower from Paradise." He asked her if her way lay with his ; she said that her home was round yonder hill, 44 TEXDRIXG COTTAGE. and his road almost in the opposite direc- tion. She offered him the help of the boy who was with her, to put him in the right road. " When we have seen you safe and at home," he answered. " Oh," she replied, " I am safe and at home on all these cliffs;" and she pursued the dizzy path that led her close by such precipitous rocks, that he wondered how she tripped along with such a fearless step ; and he thought of the poor factory girls, who had never trod any ground but the paved street leading from their squalid homes to their daily task, and how different converse with this boundless water, and the soft turf, and these rude rocks would make them; and he watched her as far as the dim light could show her. Then turning to the boy, he said, " Who is that young woman?" " They call her," said the boy, " the 1 Sailor's Pearl ;' she lives in a cottage round the cliff. But this is our way, and we must TEKDRIKG COTTAGE. 45 not lose time, for I must drive home the cows before dark." In two minutes he put him on his way ; and it was very dark when young Thornbridge arrived at the home where his friends had long expected him. It was thus these two first met, totally un- conscious that they should mutually so act on" each other's destinies. Perhaps his first unworded prayer was that those destinies should be united; and little would even Thornbridge, with his boundless benevolence, have welcomed the thought that it would be his task to call forth into life and action the devout virtues of that heart, to scratch away the dull earth that forbid that sweet plant to spring up and flower; his to draw aside the curtain and bid her look out on the world, to see its joys and its griefs, its tombs and its gardens; to point out Para- dise, but withal for another to enter in and reign. But we must wait. The house was called Trafalgar Cottage, or Nelson Villa, or some of those names in which builders by the sea-side rejoice, and 46 TENDRING COTTAGE. which are to be found by hundreds among the marine abodes on our coasts. It was, as one of them, very comfortable, with a garden walled in by shells; with beds of flowers bordered with shells, an unbroken sea view, and an unshaded sun made it, with its tall flag-staff, as like the deck of a ship as the retired officer who lived there could desire. When Thornbridge awoke he thought his heart's desires were answered, for as he lay his eye could scan the whole sea view, and he could see the vessels steering towards shore ; and if he put his head out he could see the pier, the harbour, the custom-house, and the church. And he did lean out, and his eye drank in every new sight with fresh delight. He scarcely would allow himself time for sleep. A large telescope stood on a three-legged stand in front of the cottage, and whenever a fresh vessel appeared in sight, the old sailor directed his glass to her, and told whence she came, whither she was TENDRING COTTAGE. 47 bound ; and Thornbridge watched and won- dered at his skill. " Can't you tell the captain's name?" he said, laughing. " Of one I can," replied the old man. " Do you see that little cutter; look at her," and he put the glass to Thornbridge's eye. " She is the neatest little thing on these seas, and a right good boy owns her. She is called the Pearl, after his sister, and the name suits them both, for they are the best and the prettiest." " Is that the young woman they call the ' Sailor's Pearl?" " The very same," he answered; " where did you hear of her?" Thornbridge then told how he had seen her on the preceding evening. Purvis then related her history, and the history of her family; how her father had perished at sea, and her eldest brother; how she had lived to comfort her mother, who never would be comforted; and how one after 48 TENDRING COTTAGE. another had courted her, but she would not leave the poor desolate widow. The cottage was old, but it was tastefully adorned and cared for; it was their own, with others not distant; the land and garden too belonged to them. They had several boats; one for fishing, and another which was hired for trade coasting, and that new one, he said, which beats them all. Another young man has shares in her, and people say that the sister favours him, and that perhaps they will make a match of it, and that he will get both the " pearls." As he spoke, he put his eye again to the glass. " Look at her," he exclaimed; "did you ever see a thing go so near the wind? She goes as fast as that tinkering fellow with his steam- boat. I wish I could see her with that cruiser." He then pointed out to Thorn- bridge the revenue cutter at anchor. She was American built, a pilot-boat from near New York — a clipper, as he called her. " But with all that," said the old man, " I think the Pearl would beat her." TENDRING COTTAGE. 49 CHAPTER III. For many days and weeks Thornbridge walked on the shores and on the cliffs from sunrise to sunset. He often turned towards the side of Mary's cottage ; but though he had often sat on the pier so near her home, he had never met her again. He used to talk much with the coast-guard who patroled these cliffs to stop contraband traffic, and began gradually to learn the new world into which he was launched. He followed the fisherman, and saw his struggles and his hardships; how he had come home, after nights of toil, without a single fish, at other times with the loss of all his nets and tackle. He had likewise, too, followed the peasant on the downs ; and heard how hard his fare, how great his labour; that with the sweet air and the broad blue sky, he VOL. I. D 50 TENDRING COTTAGE. had a miserable home and scanty wages compared with those he had seen earned by the artisans among whom he had lived; and gradually he began to feel that he had not, in turning his back on his manufacturing home and comrades, removed himself from human suffering and privation. He had fancied that in a cottage home, with sweet flowers planted round, the crystal stream flowing by, and forests wide and old and lawny dells behind, life would pass as in enchantment; that the hours would be too short for the exquisite happiness that could be enjoyed amid such fairy scenes, and away from the din of men and the clamour of life. But he had seen tears flow under the trellised vine, and heard many a sigh under the thatched roof, and seen discord and grief in a garden of roses. And in his lonely musings on the silent cliff, or down on the beach, or far away over the hills and fields, he considered the lot of man, and deeply he meditated on his suffering condi- tion. He had hoped that he had bid an TENDRING COTTAGE. 51 everlasting adieu to human sorrow, and he found it new modelled and new phased, but identical in all its constituent parts and characteristics. Here, as there, there was want, the sickening uncertainty how to live, the dread that when the last crust was eaten another could not be found. Here, as there, discontent brooded over life, and darkened many a gift; here, as there^ angry tempers, cold hearts, marred the joys of life ; and here, too, sickness and disease planted their poisoning arrows. " This lot of man," he often repeated to himself, " how strangely at variance with the harmony and beauty of the material world!" In the town where he had lived, he was accus- tomed to hear the masters blamed for the miseries of the poor; and though, in many cases, he saw that 'it was flagrantly unjust, yet that had not prevented his being in- clined to adopt it as a general rule. In this rural district, he could not see on whom he could lay the blame of the poverty that he witnessed, and he turned his thoughts, d2 52 TENDRIKG COTTAGE. as he had formerly done, to two or three questions. First, was it the inevitable and unavoidable condition of man so to toil and suffer? Secondly, if it were not, what measures could be adopted to lessen this heavy weight of human woe? Thirdly, whose duty it was to undertake the task? It was with thoughts like these, so earnest and serious, that he busied himself during many weeks. The manners and appearance of young Thornbridge were much above those of the class with whom he lived. His natural refinement and delicacy had seemed to reveal to him the elegance which more polished education teaches. To use a vulgar phrase, he was, in some respects, born a gentleman ; and he would have aspired to society above his own rank of life, had not his tender sympathy with the sufferings and struggles of working men, forbid his estranging him- self from them, or removing himself from the class who, in his view, were the sole inheritors of woe. He knew the desires, tastes, the capacities and endowments of TENDRING COTTAGE. 53 bis own soul, and he felt " the vague yearnings to which they gave birth." And he fancied his brother labourers felt all this, and " were doomed to a daily, weekly, yearly, round of painful toil, with scarcely any remission but for food and sleep, and those precarious and uncertain." He observed the pleasures from which they were for ever debarred, the humiliation to which they were exposed ; and he daily gathered new facts and incidents to nurture this train of thoughts, and returned home from his wanderings with some melancholy stories, which he poured into the ear of the old sailor, who always awaited him on the long wooden bench at the door of his house. He -cared but little for all his narrations, and Thornbridge generally talked him to sleep. He thought all his feelings were morbid from his delicate health, and that it was a sort of disease, that eager inquiry into suf- ferings with which he had no concern. One evening, however, he managed to interest him with his day's doings. Thornbridge left his home early one 54 TENDRING COTTAGE. morning ; a little tin case contained his daily meal, and he proposed wandering as long as the day lasted beneath the cliffs. The sea continued to him an inexhaustible source of pleasure : he never wearied listen- ing to the splash of the breaking waves; never tired of watching their advance and retreat. Like a schoolboy, he delighted to place himself on an isolated rock to see the advancing tide enclose him, and again he would follow the receding wave, so charmed with its constant variety, for he looked with awe and delight at the wild crested waves foaming over the rocks and crags, and dashing their spray over those rough bul- warks, and into the u hoary caves," owning no holding hand but the undeviating laws which bid them ebb and flow. And he adoringly gazed when not a breath ruffled the smooth expanse ; when each floating cloud carried its shadow across to reveal new colours, and, most of all, when, at sun- set, or moonlight, it brought heaven to earth with its bright reflections. So Thornbridge TENDRING COTTAGE. 55 started to spend another clay in what he called Nature's great Temple. There was a beautiful little bay, enclosed with very high cliffs, which particularly charmed him ; the sand was so smooth and so firm, and the solitude so deep, the birds who built their nests far above his head were his only com- panions, and he chose it for his resting place. The tide was advancing and covered the rocks at each side, so that in these spring tides he could not get round those two pro- jections, or leave his retreat, till the watery barrier descended. While he sat and read, and thought and looked, a small boat was rowed into his retreat, and as it neared the shore two women came out from a cave in the side of the cliff, which was quite con- cealed by the broken rocks ; they came down to the beach to meet the boat. Thornbridge had so placed himself in a sort of cradle of rocks that no one could see him, and yet he could observe all that passed. The boat came very near, and the men threw two small kegs ashore, and then rowed away. 56 TBNDEING COTTAGE. The women seized the little vessels, for which they were evidently waiting, and then returned to their cave ; but, before they had concealed themselves, two of the coast-guard appeared above on the edge of the cliff; by help from those who remained behind they descended the precipitous face of the rock, and thence climbed with mar- vellous skill to the entrance of the hiding place of the two women. The poor crea- tures expostulated and entreated, but the guard had no alternative; they seized the brandy, and only waited for the fall of the tide to bring the two culprits before their officer. The cries of these poor women touched Thornbridge ; and, not quite under- standing the scene, he left his conceal- ment, and, clambering over the fragments, he joined the sailors during a most angry colloquy. The women would not tell the names of the boatmen. One of them, an English- woman, sullenly denied any knowledge of them; the other, an Irishwoman, irritated TENDRING COTTAGE. 57 them by the most provoking way of parry- ing and answering. " Tell me who manned the boat, and you shall have your brandy." " It's for the like of you to find that out." " Yes," said the man, " and I'll get it out of you." " Sure such a great gintleman doesn't need me to tell him his trade ; the Queen, God bless her ! pays you to find it out for yoursel'." " She does not," answered the young man, angrily. " Then, may be," said the woman, archly, u you've little right to be here — is it a drop you want yourself, or for the childer at home?" " It's you, you old hag, that I want, if you wont tell me who owned that boat." u Then you must just be happy with tlte old one," she replied " for sorra a bit will I tell you; is it I who would betray the child I reared?" d3 58 TENDRING COTTAGE. " Your son, do you say ? You have none, you know." " Then it would be hard to betray him." " Come, come," said the coast-guard, " it's of no manner of use palavering here ; we can soon get round, and off you go if you wont tell." " I'll tell," answered she, " all in good time." " This is good time; speak out, old lady." " May be I call it a bad time." " It matters little," he answered ; " I have other means of knowing," and the man smiled. " God bless him," said the woman, " for his fine teeth I it's a nice minute to show them when he thinks he can tear the widow's heart, rob her hearth, and drive her darling to the prison house. I'm ready," she con- tinued, and turning to the water, she said, " God help him, and give him good luck across the seas !" But when she found that he was in earnest she changed her tone, and told such a piteous tale of want and suffer- ings; how life depended on the sale of the TENDRING COTTAGE. 59 brandy; how she offered it to him at half its value, if he would let her off, and have the few shillings to carry home to those who so needed it. As she talked and implored mercy (waiting for an uncovered strand), Thorn- bridge asked her silent companion what was their offence, and what their threatened punishment. "Smuggling brandy," was her reply. " She bought it honestly on the other side, and if we might sell it, we could pay the rent and feed the children; but they wont let us," she said, pointing to the sailors. Drying her eyes, the poor Irish woman again changed her tone. — " Is it so poor she is ? — bad luck to her if she wants the children's bread!" " The Queen wants her own, like other people ; besides, it's not her affair." " Give me the good money I paid for it, and you shall have it, and pay as much duty as you like — that's little enough, I'm thinking." But it was all vain, and they all turned to go round the projecting rock. It 60 TENDRIXG COTTAGE. was becoming dark, and, in an instant, as they turned the corner, these two women disappeared ; every moment made the search more difficult, and the sailors, laden with the forfeited brandy, returned to their post, while Thornbridge took a narrow path tip the rock, by which he was convinced the women had escaped. This path led to Mrs. Johnson's cottage, and when he had pur- sued it some little way, he saw women talk- ing at the gate of her garden, with two other figures. On approaching, he found that it was Mary, the Sailor's Pearl, and her brother, conversing with the fugitive smug- glers. He apologized for his intrusion, related what he had seen and heard, to account for the deep interest they had ex- cited in him, and asked if he could in any way help them. Mary knew the culprits well, and told him that the poor Irish woman had immigrated here in company with a large family whose parents died, and this faithful creature had taken them as her own, and provided for TENDRING COTTAGE. 61 them ; the other was in equal poverty, and they both had subsisted for some time in a way no one knew, for the children were better fed and clothed than heretofore. But every one feared that the widow had induced the eldest of the boys to join some smugglers, and it was even thought that they sent their little savings to the coast of France to buy brandy, which they could sell at such a profit as to secure them the neces- saries of life if nothing more. Mary took the poor women into the house, and gave them food. Her brother seemed as sorry for the failure of this poor woman's trade as if he had been the loser, and he sent them home, bidding them hope and look for better fortune in future. Thornbridge was surprised to hear how little they appeared to blame the poor women. He had never seen smuggling, and never known nor thought anything on the subject, either as a crime or a trade. In his inland city home he had never been called to consider it, though of the 62 TENDRING COTTAGE. twin sin — poaching — he was well instructed ; all he had heard of smuggling was from the coast guard, who spoke chiefly of the trick and adventure accompanying it, and who always spoke of smugglers, as indeed they were, desperate, reckless men, who were regardless of life and principle. He had dismissed them from his thoughts as objects of no interest, and when he saw the poor helpless women in conflict with the armed guard, and found that the cause of strife was the possession of a keg of brandy, which they had bought, he began to ask himself what this smuggling really meant ; and finding, also, from Johnson's manner that he did not treat them as the guilty beings he had imagined them, he resolved to ask more about them. Johnson invited him to come in and wait for the moon to rise, for it was then almost too dark to walk along the cliff home. He gladly accepted his offer, and followed him into the room which overlooked the sea. Mary and her mother were there; her TENDRING COTTAGE. 63 health was then failing, and her daughter was arranging the evening meal. Every thing was beautifully clean; the cloth spread on the table was as white as snow, and every thing had that peculiar aspect which marks a woman's careful housewifery. All was made as elegant as was possible in that simple life, and Thornbridge looked round with wonder ; and as Mary presented her mother with the simple prescribed diet, he thought that she surpassed in beauty and interest every one he had ever seen; she personified all he had dreamt of and ima- gined — a being, he thought, in perfect har- mony with all the beautiful scenes on which he had now been accustomed to dwell, as much superior to all he had yet seen, as the objects which surrounded him at K were to the crowded streets and houses of his own home. His whole soul was disposed to do homage to this embodying of his ideals and the warmth of his admiration added to the embarrassment and coldness of his ex- ternal manner and appearance. He accepted 64 TENDRIXG COTTAGE. the seat Johnson offered him, and forgot the strangeness of his position in a house where he was unknown by name or character. Awaking from his reverie, he strove to apologize for his intrusion, but he failed, and with difficulty could answer the inqui- ries which Mrs. Johnson made. Her son speedily joined them, and explained to her how he and the stranger had met; and he began with the freedom and frankness of a sailor to relate what had happened. Mrs. Johnson asked Thornbridge what he had seen and heard, and listened with great interest. " The elder woman, the widow/' she said, " I have known all my life, and she might have told her friend what good she had got from smuggling; she ought to have had enough of it before this." " How so?" said Thornbridge. " Why, she married a fine young man, who left his trade, joined a set of idle fellows, ran a cargo, was seized and put in prison, and became a complete ruffian. She never had a day's happiness TENDRING COTTAGE. G5 after; and that's what she gets from smug- gling." " Why, mother," said young Johnson, "it was in prison that you say he learnt evil." " And what took him there?" " The custom-house officers." " It was his own evil doings ; he had cheated the Queen of her lawful dues, and, as your father always said, whoever starts by doing that, finishes by fitting himself for the gallows. He had seen many, and knew it well." " Never mind, dear mother," replied her son. " They wont hang the poor women, though you think that they deserve it." "But who told you that some young ones wont be led into trouble? Pray, sir," turning to Thornbridge, " have you been long in this part of the country ?" He told her that he had only been in that neighbourhood three months, and that he had been sent there for delicate health. " Then, sir," she answered, " you, perhaps, don't know all the evil that smuggling does 66 TENDMNG COTTAGE. to this neighbourhood? I am always telling my daughter to have nothing to say to their families ; but she's too fond of helping them." Johnson then related numbers of interest- ing stories, and Thornbrige was a silent and observant listener. Mary soon summoned her mother to bed, and when she had done everything for her comfort, she returned to her brother and his guest, who were talking in the little porch, watching the rising moon. She would have lingered there till daybreak, for every word that fell from her lips confirmed his first impression, and con- vinced him that her fair form was but an index of the soul within. He never ventured to tell her that he remembered having seen her before, and that he had often sat on their pier with the hope of meeting her. They spoke, though, on many less interesting subjects, and Mary told him a great deal about the struggles of the poor near, particularly of the fishermen's families — of their hardships and privations. She told him, too, of her mother's life of TENDRING COTTAGE. 67 grief and mourning. She had never seen any one who spoke as he did. Though much recovered he looked pale and ill, and she listened to him with great interest. No human being could present a greater con- trast to the men she was in the habit of seeing. He had read more, and thought more than any one she had ever seen. He talked of things she had never heard before, but which met a quick response in her own soul. She had, indeed, read diligently ; his- toric and religious books formed her chief library, though some of our poets had been added to her store; but all she there learned was like a dead language. For the first time she heard it spoken, in a way rough and unpolished, but the man and the poet burst forth from beneath his humble garb,*and Mary greeted him as a prophet who told strange things. Every one, even if hackneyed in society, feels how life seems changed, when a man of strong individu- ality and poetic lire throws his views abroad ; the facts and scenes seem other than those 68 TEXDRIXG COTTAGE. we have been accustomed to look at. It was, then, no wonder that Mary Johnson listened with absorbing interest to all that Thornbridge told her. Those around Mary could not read her whole character; her nature so intense, so poetic, needed but the spark to kindle it. She was as a phantom ship built by angel hands; and daily they descended with some new gift, and then they winged away to see her put out to sea ; for who could guess it was to be launched in such a stormy water, to prove well of what she was made? Her brother accompanied him part of the way home; when they reached the top of the hill, which overlooked the cottage, Thornbridge turned and looked round. It was a cloudless night, and the scene was enchanting. Mary was still standing by herself in the porch of their house, looking, like him, at the bright moon and the silvered sea. There was no other light but that from the window of her cottage, and no other sign of a human habi- TENDRING COTTAGE. 69 tation, and lie wished that he might keep guard there on that high cliff while she slept; but he was obliged to go forward. The young men parted, and Johnson pressed his new acquaintance to renew his visit. This, indeed, he gladly did, and spent several successive evenings there with increased happiness. Mary sat like his pupil when he opened his favourite authors, and listened with a warm and responding heart when he recurred to his favourite theme, the suffer- ings of man: for Thornbridge had ever allowed himself to dwell on this chequered life too narrowly; he had always been in- clined to look rather at this life as a whole y when its miseries chafed him and tore his soul, rather than as a brief chapter in the existence of man. This visible material world seemed to bound his views and so engross his sympathies, that he never could be brought to admit that suf- fering could be a good; the darkness of such a mystery forbade his ever dwelling on it. 70 TENDRING COTTAGE. But these halcyon days passed very quickly. One evening he and Johnson had walked together on these cliffs. There was some- thing in Mary's brother that pleased him, and he parted from him reluctantly; he scarcely knew why, hut he turned and watched him with deep interest, as he pur- sued his way back to Tendring Cottage. When he arrived home the old sailor was waiting for him, and they stood together watching the stars, while Thornbridge talked to him of Mary and William Johnson : he told also of the scene under the cliffs with the poor women. Purvis was unusually grave, and muttered some oaths which Thornbridge could not understand. The next morning the old man was at his usual post, walking up and down before the door, and now and again looking over the " old element," to see what was doing. "There she goes again," he exclaimed: u look at her, how well she behaves.'' " What is it, sir?" said Thornbridge. TENDRING COTTAGE. 71 " She's out again this morning, and I can't make out what she's doing." " Perhaps she's fishing," said Thorn- bridge. " Fishing," replied his old friend ; " much you know about it. She's rigged for run- ning a race. Very clever !" he exclaimed, while he watched her tacking and beat- ing to windward. " You are a pearl ! I wish I knew what you are at." " The Pearl" answered Thornbridge : " young Johnson told me last night that he would go out if there came any wind." " There's plenty to-day, if that's all he wants. I wish I knew what use he made of it. I don't like his looks." And the old man walked up and down without saying more. Thornbridge had derived all the benefit expected from his sojourn at the sea side ; but still the medical men were unanimous in the opinion that his return to his former life and habits would inevitably bring back the malady from which he had already suffered. 72 TENDRING COTTAGE. He could not conscientiously remain a burden to his father; he had therefore allowed an application to be made for some employment in the town where he then lived. His father applied to friends who respected him, and the result had been an appointment to a place in the Custom House of K . Without knowing why, he had always disliked the idea of such an occupa- tion, and nothing but a sense of duty to his father had induced him to accept the nomination. He entered on his new duties a few days before the death of Mary's mother. TENDR1NG COTTAGE. 73 CHAPTER IV. Though young Thornbridge was such a valued friend, and received such sincere wel- come from Mary and her mother, he was not thought the most favoured of her admirers. The one supposed to receive the most encouragement was young Meldon, the son of her father's friend and associate. He owned half of her brother's new boat, and there was a sort of partnership between them, as there had been between their fathers. In that instance, however, the friendship had founded on the esteem and reliance they had mutually placed in each other's good conduct and principles. For many years after Johnson's death, Meldon had managed his affairs, and re- VOL. I. E 74 TENDRING COTTAGE. mittecl to his family their share of the profits: he was willing to bear all the fatigue and exposure, and allow them the same benefit that they would have reaped had Johnson been still living. These friends were destined to a similar fate; and the poor widow's eldest boy perished with Meldon in one of those terrific gales which strewed the coast with wrecks, and carried such desolation into the sailors' homes. Young Meldon was then but a boy, and was taken by the captain of an East Indiaman, in the hope that he might in time obtain some good command. But he was unruly and insubordinate, and after several trials he was sent home. For some time they hoped he would become steady and industrious; at first he was indefatigable. He was a gallant, dashing sailor, with a handsome person, and that frank, open manner which often succeeds with women when sterling virtue and goodness fail, and TENDRING COTTAGE. 75 which contrasted with Thornbriclge's reserve and awkwardness much to the advantage of Meldon. His ruling passion seemed the love of adventure. This had already brought him into trouble, and caused the failure of his early prospects ; he was, however, John- son's constant companion — at sea and on shore they were always together; and young Meldon's fund of amusing tales, his strange stories and adventures, enlivened many an evening party round the widow's hearth. Notwithstanding the interest with which she listened to all his relations, the poor widow had a great fear that Mary should feel the charm of his society. She con- trasted him with her own husband, and thought that, if her lot was so full of care with such a man as God had blest her with, what would Mary suffer if she loved, and joined her fate with such a thoughtless, heedless man as Meldon. She felt he was E 2 76- TENDRING COTTAGE. in some degree made to attract a woman, and bring her into grief. At one time she reasoned that Mary's goodness would pre- vent her loving a man, who, with some fine qualities, had never a serious thought, the mere child of impulse and passion, with in- distinct views of right and wrong. Then she remembered the strange way in which some excellent women bestow their affec- tions — how little they seem to value moral worth — how ignorantly they despise or overlook the qualities most essential to- their happiness. Mary's mother could not read her child's heart; when anything oc- curred which displayed Meldon's disregard of dutiful obligations, she watched to see how Mary felt ; but she never was satisfied ; the certainty of sorrow, if she loved Meldon, was the only thing she clearly saw. That Mary was insensible to his attractive qualities would be to suppose her far other- wise constituted than we shall find her. TENDRING COTTAGE. 77 The serious and solitary character of her life made her peculiarly liable to be strongly impressed by the few who frequented her society; and, perhaps, in no one did the besoin aV aimer exist more strongly : the fibres of her heart shot forth with vigour, and seemed ready to entwine themselves round every object that presented itself. But they had not, as yet, wound them- selves round Meldon; for often, when she thought that she almost loved him, the heart recoiled. Meldon never concealed his faults ; and sometimes the ingenuous nature seemed to claim affection; but his candour revealed qualities which were antidotes to the sentiments his honesty inspired. Perhaps, if Mary had never seen one who could teach her what love was, she would have fancied herself in love with Meldon. Still it could not be denied, that she liked him, was interested in him, and always fearful, in his absence, of evil betiding him. 78 TENDRING COTTAGE. In her solitude she had read much, and formed a sort of beau ideal of her own : that merciful shield to guard persons of warm imagination — saving them from so much false worship by the deifying of a vague and unattainable standard — but keeping the soul alive to every impression. Mary, however, was sheltered in an ark, for she had learned from infancy to listen to the claims of duty and right; never had she turned a deaf ear to their sacred voice ; never sought to reason herself out of their authority, and so she had never wandered to the right or left. Will that pure morning life ensure a meridian day of peace and brightness? Perhaps not : but evening, what will be its colour? perhaps mist may hang there too. But the rising? Oh, there is the cloudless sky — so, Mary, fear not: the same voice whispers it to you as spoke in the fair garden of Palestine. TENDRING COTTAGE. 79 Meldon had sailed with young Johnson two days before his mother died. They promised to be absent but two tides, and it was their return she was so anxiously expecting when death seized her, and car- ried her away without bequeathing William her blessing. 80 TENDRING COTTAGE, CHAPTER V. The nurse obeyed William Johnson's di- rections. She was a faithful old creature, and lived with them till Mary grew up. Now she daily ministered to them. She informed his uncle of Mrs. Johnson's death, and of her daughter's desolate posi- tion, and then hastened to the Hall, for there were her most kind and sympathizing friends. It was an old, manorial-looking building, recently repaired and beautified. Conran Conran, the proprietor, was sit- ting in the drawing-room, with his mother and sister, and the lady to whom he was engaged to be married. " Really, Conran," said his mother, " I wish you would find something better to do TENDRIXG COTTAGE. 81 than lounging on the sofa, and twisting those tassels. If you will be idle, at least