The Pilgrims of the Rhine
Page 56
CHAPTER XXV. THE IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.--A COMMON INCIDENT NOT BEFOREDESCRIBED.--TREVYLYAN AND GERTRUDE.
THE day now grew cool as it waned to its decline, and the breeze camesharp upon the delicate frame of the sufferer. They resolved to proceedno farther; and as they carried with them attendants and baggage, whichrendered their route almost independent of the ordinary accommodation,they steered for the opposite shore, and landed at a village beautifullysequestered in a valley, and where they fortunately obtained a lodgingnot often met with in the regions of the picturesque.
When Gertrude, at an early hour, retired to bed, Vane and Du-----e fellinto speculative conversation upon the nature of man. Vane's philosophywas of a quiet and passive scepticism; the physician dared more boldly,and rushed from doubt to negation. The attention of Trevylyan, as he satapart and musing, was arrested in despite of himself. He listened to anargument in which he took no share, but which suddenly inspired him withan interest in that awful subject which, in the heat of youth and theoccupations of the world, had never been so prominently called forthbefore.
"What," thought he, with unutterable anguish, as he listened to theearnest vehemence of the Frenchman and the tranquil assent of Vane, "ifthis creed were indeed true,--if there be no other world,--Gertrude islost to me eternally, through the dread gloom of death there would breakforth no star!"
That is a peculiar incident that perhaps occurs to us all at times, butwhich I have never found expressed in books, namely, to hear a doubt offuturity at the very moment in which the present is most overcast; andto find at once this world stripped of its delusion and the next of itsconsolation. It is perhaps for others, rather than ourselves, that thefond heart requires a Hereafter. The tranquil rest, the shadow, and thesilence, the mere pause of the wheel of life, have no terror for thewise, who know the due value of the world.
"After the billows of a stormy sea, Sweet is at last the haven of repose!"
But not so when that stillness is to divide us eternally from others;when those we have loved with all the passion, the devotion, thewatchful sanctity of the weak human heart, are to exist to us no more!when, after long years of desertion and widowhood on earth, there isto be no hope of reunion in that INVISIBLE beyond the stars; when thetorch, not of life only, but of love, is to be quenched in the DarkFountain, and the grave, that we would fain hope is the great restorerof broken ties, is but the dumb seal of hopeless, utter, inexorableseparation! And it is this thought, this sentiment, which makes religionout of woe, and teaches belief to the mourning heart that in thegladness of united affections felt not the necessity of a heaven! To howmany is the death of the beloved the parent of faith!
Stung by his thoughts, Trevylyan rose abruptly, and stealing from thelowly hostelry, walked forth amidst the serene and deepening night; fromthe window of Gertrude's room the light streamed calm on the purple air.
With uneven steps and many a pause, he paced to and fro beneath thewindow, and gave the rein to his thoughts. How intensely he felt the ALLthat Gertrude was to him! how bitterly he foresaw the change in his lotand character that her death would work out! For who that met him inlater years ever dreamed that emotions so soft, and yet so ardent, hadvisited one so stern? Who could have believed that time was when thepolished and cold Trevylyan had kept the vigils he now held below thechamber of one so little like himself as Gertrude, in that remote andsolitary hamlet; shut in by the haunted mountains of the Rhine, andbeneath the moonlight of the romantic North?
While thus engaged, the light in Gertrude's room was suddenlyextinguished; it is impossible to express how much that trivial incidentaffected him! It was like an emblem of what was to come; the light hadbeen the only evidence of life that broke upon that hour, and he wasnow left alone with the shades of night. Was not this like the herald ofGertrude's own death; the extinction of the only living ray that brokeupon the darkness of the world?
His anguish, his presentiment of utter desolation, increased. He groanedaloud; he dashed his clenched hand to his breast; large and cold dropsof agony stole down his brow. "Father," he exclaimed with a strugglingvoice, "let this cup pass from me! Smite my ambition to the root;curse me with poverty, shame, and bodily disease; but leave me this onesolace, this one companion of my fate!"
At this moment Gertrude's window opened gently, and he heard accentssteal soothingly upon his ear.
"Is not that your voice, Albert?" said she, softly. "I heard it just asI lay down to rest, and could not sleep while you were thus exposed tothe damp night air. You do not answer; surely it is your voice: whendid I mistake it for another's?" Mastering with a violent effort hisemotions, Trevylyan answered, with a sort of convulsive gayety,--
"Why come to these shores, dear Gertrude, unless you are honoured withthe chivalry that belongs to them? What wind, what blight, can harm mewhile within the circle of your presence; and what sleep can bring medreams so dear as the waking thought of you?"
"It is cold," said Gertrude, shivering; "come in, dear Albert, I beseechyou, and I will thank you to-morrow." Gertrude's voice was choked by thehectic cough, that went like an arrow to Trevylyan's heart; and he feltthat in her anxiety for him she was now exposing her own frame to theunwholesome night.
He spoke no more, but hurried within the house; and when the gray lightof morn broke upon his gloomy features, haggard from the want of sleep,it might have seemed, in that dim eye and fast-sinking cheek, as if thelovers were not to be divided--even by death itself.