CHAPTER XV. THE BANKS OF THE RHINE.--FROM THE DRACHENFELS TO BROHL.--ANINCIDENT THAT SUFFICES IN THIS TALE FOR AN EPOCH.
FROM the Drachenfels commences the true glory of the Rhine; and oncemore Gertrude's eyes conquered the languor that crept gradually overthem as she gazed on the banks around.
Fair blew the breeze, and freshly curled the waters; and Gertrude didnot feel the vulture that had fixed its talons within her breast. TheRhine widens, like a broad lake, between the Drachenfels and Unkel;villages are scattered over the extended plain on the left; on the rightis the Isle of Werth and the houses of Oberwinter; the hills are coveredwith vines; and still Gertrude turned back with a lingering gaze to thelofty crest of the Seven Hills.
On, on--and the spires of Unkel rose above a curve in the banks, andon the opposite shore stretched those wondrous basaltic columns whichextend to the middle of the river, and when the Rhine runs low, youmay see them like an engulfed city beneath the waves. You then view theruins of Okkenfels, and hear the voice of the pastoral Gasbach pouringits waters into the Rhine. From amidst the clefts of the rocks the vinepeeps luxuriantly forth, and gives a richness and colouring to whatNature, left to herself, intended for the stern.
"But turn your eye backward to the right," said Trevylyan; "those bankswere formerly the special haunt of the bold robbers of the Rhine, andfrom amidst the entangled brakes that then covered the ragged cliffsthey rushed upon their prey. In the gloomy canvas of those feudal dayswhat vigorous and mighty images were crowded! A robber's life amidstthese mountains, and beside this mountain stream, must have been thevery poetry of the spot carried into action."
They rested at Brohl, a small town between two mountains. On the summitof one you see the gray remains of Rheinech. There is something weirdand preternatural about the aspect of this place; its soil betrays signsthat in the former ages (from which even tradition is fast fading away)some volcano here exhausted its fires. The stratum of the earth is blackand pitchy, and the springs beneath it are of a dark and graveolentwater. Here the stream of the Brohlbach falls into the Rhine, and ina valley rich with oak and pine, and full of caverns, which are notwithout their traditionary inmates, stands the castle of Schweppenbourg,which our party failed not to visit.
Gertrude felt fatigued on their return, and Trevylyan sat by her in thelittle inn, while Vane went forth, with the curiosity of science, toexamine the strata of the soil.
They conversed in the frankness of their plighted troth upon thosetopics which are only for lovers: upon the bright chapter in the historyof their love; their first meeting; their first impressions; the littleincidents in their present journey,--incidents noticed by themselvesalone; that life _within_ life which two persons know together,--whichone knows not without the other, which ceases to both the instant theyare divided.
"I know not what the love of others may be," said Gertrude, "butours seems different from all of which I have read. Books tell us ofjealousies and misconstructions, and the necessity of an absence, thesweetness of a quarrel; but we, dearest Albert, have had no experienceof these passages in love. _We_ have never misunderstood each other;_we_ have no reconciliation to look back to. When was there everoccasion for me to ask forgiveness from you? Our love is made up only ofone memory,--unceasing kindness! A harsh word, a wronging thought, neverbroke in upon the happiness we have felt and feel."
"Dearest Gertrude," said Trevylyan, "that character of our love iscaught from you; you, the soft, the gentle, have been its pervadinggenius; and the well has been smooth and pure, for you were the spiritthat lived within its depths."
And to such talk succeeded silence still more sweet,--the silence ofthe hushed and overflowing heart. The last voices of the birds, the sunslowly sinking in the west, the fragrance of descending dews, filledthem with that deep and mysterious sympathy which exists between Loveand Nature.
It was after such a silence--a long silence, that seemed but as amoment--that Trevylyan spoke, but Gertrude answered not; and, yearningonce more for her sweet voice, he turned and saw that she had faintedaway.
This was the first indication of the point to which her increasingdebility had arrived. Trevylyan's heart stood still, and then beatviolently; a thousand fears crept over him; he clasped her in hisarms, and bore her to the open window. The setting sun fell upon hercountenance, from which the play of the young heart and warm fancyhad fled, and in its deep and still repose the ravages of disease weredarkly visible. What were then his emotions! His heart was like stone;but he felt a rush as of a torrent to his temples: his eyes grewdizzy,--he was stunned by the greatness of his despair. For the lastweek he had taken hope for his companion; Gertrude had seemed so muchstronger, for her happiness had given her a false support. And thoughthere had been moments when, watching the bright hectic come and go,and her step linger, and the breath heave short, he had felt the hopesuddenly cease, yet never had he known till now that fulness of anguish,that dread certainty of the worst, which the calm, fair face before himstruck into his soul; and mixed with this agony as he gazed was allthe passion of the most ardent love. For there she lay in his arms,the gentle breath rising from lips where the rose yet lingered, andthe long, rich hair, soft and silken as an infant's, stealing fromits confinement: everything that belonged to Gertrude's beauty was soinexpressibly soft and pure and youthful! Scarcely seventeen, she seemedmuch younger than she was; her figure had sunken from its roundness, butstill how light, how lovely were its wrecks! the neck whiter than snow,the fair small hand! Her weight was scarcely felt in the arms of herlover; and he--what a contrast!--was in all the pride and flower ofglorious manhood! His was the lofty brow, the wreathing hair, thehaughty eye, the elastic form; and upon this frail, perishable thinghad he fixed all his heart, all the hopes of his youth, the pride of hismanhood, his schemes, his energies, his ambition!
"Oh, Gertrude!" cried he, "is it--is it thus--is there indeed no hope?"
And Gertrude now slowly recovering, and opening her eyes uponTrevylyan's face, the revulsion was so great, his emotions sooverpowering, that, clasping her to his bosom, as if even death shouldnot tear her away from him, he wept over her in an agony of tears; notthose tears that relieve the heart, but the fiery rain of the internalstorm, a sign of the fierce tumult that shook the very core of hisexistence, not a relief.
Awakened to herself, Gertrude, in amazement and alarm, threw her armsaround his neck, and, looking wistfully into his face, implored him tospeak to her.
"Was it my illness, love?" said she; and the music of her voice onlyconveyed to him the thought of how soon it would be dumb to him forever."Nay," she continued winningly, "it was but the heat of the day; I ambetter now,--I am well; there is no cause to be alarmed for me!" andwith all the innocent fondness of extreme youth, she kissed the burningtears from his eyes.
There was a playfulness, an innocence in this poor girl, so unconsciousas yet of her destiny, which rendered her fate doubly touching,and which to the stern Trevylyan, hackneyed by the world, made herirresistible charm; and now as she put aside her hair, and looked upgratefully, yet pleadingly, into his face, he could scarce refrain frompouring out to her the confession of his anguish and despair. But thenecessity of self-control, the necessity of concealing from _her_ aknowledge which might only, by impressing her imagination, expedite herdoom, while it would embitter to her mind the unconscious enjoyment ofthe hour, nerved and manned him. He checked by those violent effortswhich only men can make, the evidence of his emotions; and endeavoured,by a rapid torrent of words, to divert her attention from a weakness,the causes of which he could not explain. Fortunately Vane soonreturned, and Trevylyan, consigning Gertrude to his care, hastily leftthe room.
Gertrude sank into a revery.
"Ah, dear father!" said she, suddenly, and after a pause, "if I indeedwere worse than I have thought myself of late, if I were to die now,what would Trevylyan feel? Pray God I may live for his sake!"
"My child, do not talk thus; you are better, much better than you were.Ere the autumn e
nds, Trevylyan's happiness will be your lawful care. Donot think so despondently of yourself."
"I thought not of myself," sighed Gertrude, "but of _him_!"
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