“All this was rather too much for me to bear, in addition to the load already pressing on my heart; so without waiting for my horse to be fed, I mounted him and proceeded.
73“My next stop was in H—. There the company had mustered on the green, in readiness to begin their march. Some infirm old men, a few young mothers, with babies in their arms, and all the boys in the town, had gathered for the last farewell. The soldiers were resting on their muskets, and the clergyman imploring the benediction of Heaven on their heads. ‘Can England,’ thought I, ‘hope to subdue a country that sends forth its defenders in such a spirit, with arms of such a temper?’ Oh, why does she not respect in her children the transmitted character of their fathers!
“I arrived at Mrs. Ashley’s just as the family were sitting down to tea. She and the girls are in fine spirits, having recently received from the colonel accounts of some fortunate skirmishes with the British. The changed aspect of her once sumptuous tea-table at first shocked me; but my keen appetite (for the first time in my life, my dear mother, I had fasted all day) quite overcame my sensibilities; the honest pride with which my patriotic hostess told me she had converted all her table-cloths into shirts for her husband’s men, and the complacency with which she commended her sage tea, magnified the virtues of her brown bread, and self-sweetened sweetmeats would have given a relish to coarser fare more coarsely served.
“I have been pondering on the character of our New-England people during my ride. The aspect of our society is quiet, and, to a cursory observer, it appears tame. We seem to have the plodding, safe, self-preserving virtues; to be industrious, frugal, provident, and cautious; but to want the enthusiasm that gives to life all its poetry and almost all its charms. But it is not so; there is a strong under-current. Let the individual or the people be roused by a motive that approves itself to the reasoning and religious mind, a fervid energy, an all-subduing enthusiasm bursts forth, not like an accidental and transient conflagration, but operating, like the elements, to great effects, and irresistibly. This enthusiasm, this central fire, is now at its 74height. It not only inflames the eloquence of the orator, kindles the heart of the soldier, the beacon-lights and strong defences of our land; but it lights the temple of God, and burns on the family altar. The old man throws away his crutch; the yeoman leaves the plough in the half-turned furrow; and the loving, quiet matron like you, my dear mother, lays aside her domestic anxieties, dispenses with her household comforts, and gives the God-speed to her sons to go forth and battle it for their country. The nature of the contest in which we are engaged illustrates my idea. Its sublimity is sometimes obscured by the extravagance of party zeal. We have not been goaded to resistance by oppression, nor fretted and chafed, with bits and collars, to madness; but our sages, bold with the transmitted spirit of freedom, sown at broadcast by our Pilgrim fathers, have reflected on the past and calculated the future; and coolly estimating the worth of independence and the right of self-government, are willing to hazard all in the hope of gaining all; to sacrifice themselves for the prospective good of their children. This is the dignified resolve of thinking beings, not the angry impatience of overburdened animals.
“But good-night, dear mother. After this I shall have incidents, and not reflections merely, to send you. The pine-knot, by the light of which I have written this, is just flickering its last flame. ‘I cannot afford you a candle,’ said my good hostess when she bade me good-night; ‘we sold our tallow to purchase necessaries for the colonel’s men—poor fellows, some of them are yet barefooted!’
“I shall enclose a line to Bessie—perhaps she will show it to you; but do not ask it of her. Tell dear Fan I shall remember her charge, and give the socks she knit to the first ‘brave barefooted soldier’ I see. Sam must feed Steady for me; and dear little Hal must continue, as he has begun, to couple brother Eliot with the ‘poor soldiers’ in his prayers. Again farewell, dear mother. Your little Bible is before me; my eye rests on the few lines you traced 75on the title-page; and as I press my lips to them, they inspire holy resolutions. God grant I may not mistake their freshness for vigour. What I may be is uncertain; but I shall ever remain, as I am now, dearest mother,
“Your devoted son,
“Eliot Lee.”
Eliot found his letter to his sister a difficult task. He was to treat a malady, the existence of which the patient had never acknowledged to him. He wrote, effaced, and re-wrote, and finally sent the following:—
“My sweet sister Bessie, nothing has afflicted me so much in leaving home as parting from you. I am inclined to believe there can be no stronger nor tenderer affection than that of brother and sister; the sense of protection on one part, and dependance on the other; the sweet recollections of childhood; the unity of interest; and the communion of memory and hope, blend their hearts together into one existence. So it is with us—is it not, my dear sister? With me, certainly; for though, like most young men, I have had my fancies, they have passed by like the summer breeze, and left no trace of their passage. All the love, liking (I cannot find a word to express the essential volatility of the sentiment in my experience of it) that I have ever felt for all my favourites, brown and fair, does not amount to one thousandth part of the immutable affection that I bear you, my dear sister. I speak only of my own experience, Bessie, and, as I well know, against the faith of the world. I should be told that my fraternal love would pale in the fires of another passion, as does a lamp at the shining of the sun; but I don’t believe a word of it—do you, Bessie? I am not, my dear sister, playing the inquisitor with you, but fearfully and awkwardly enough approaching a subject on which I thought it would be easier to write than to speak; but I find it cannot be easy to do that, in any mode, which may pain you.
76“I have neglected the duty I owed you; and yet, perhaps, no vigilance could have prevented the natural consequence of your intercourse with one of the most fascinating men in the world. There, it is out!—and now I can write freely. I said I had neglected my duty; but I was not conscious of this till too late. The truth is, my mind has been so engrossed with political subjects, so harassed with importunate cravings and conflicting duties, that I was for a long time unobservant of what was passing under my eye. I awoke as from a dream, and found (or feared) that my sister’s happiness was at stake; that she had given, and given to one unworthy, the irrequitable boon of her affections; irrequitable, but, thank Heaven, not irrecoverable. No, I do not believe one word of all the trumpery about incurable love. I will not adopt a faith, however old and prevailing, which calls in question our moral power to achieve any conquest over ourselves. For my own part, I do not think we have any power over our affections to give or withdraw them, or even to measure their amount. This may seem a startling assertion, and contradictory of what I have said above; but it is not. The sentiment I there alluded to is generated by accidental circumstances, is half illusion, unsustained by reason, unauthorized by realities—not the immortal love infused by Heaven and sustained by truth; but a disease very mortal and very curable, dear Bessie, believe me. Such a mind as yours, so pure, so elevated, has a self-rectifying power. You have felt the influence of the delightful qualities which M—undoubtedly possesses; and why should you not, for who is more susceptible to grace and refinement than yourself? Heaven has so arranged the relations of affections and qualities, that, as I have said above, we can neither give nor withhold our love—the heart has no tenants at will. If M—has assumed, or you have imputed to him qualities which he does not possess, your affection will be dissipated with the illusion. But if the spell still remains unbroken, I entreat you, my dear sister, not to waste your sensibility, the precious food of life, the life of life, in moping melancholy.
77“‘Attach thee firmly (I quote from memory) to the virtuous deeds
And offices of love—to love itself,
With all its vain and transient joys, sit loose.’
“I have long had a lurking distrust of M—. He has acted too cautious a part in politics for a
sound heart. Let a man run the risk of hanging for it either way; but if he have a spark of generosity, he will be either a whole-souled whig or a loyal tory in these times.
“I know what M—has so often reiterated. ‘He had a mother in England; all his friends were on the royal side; and, on the other hand, his property was here, and might depend on the favour of the rebels; and indeed, there was so much to be said on both sides, that a man might well pause!’ There are moments in men’s histories when none but cowards or knaves, or (worse than either) cold-blooded, selfish wretches, would pause!
“It is possible that I misjudge him; Heaven grant it! All that I know is, that he is in New-York no longer, pausing, but the aid of General Clinton. It is barely possible that he has written; letters are not transmitted with any security in these times; but why did he not speak before he went? why, up to the very hour of his departure (as my mother says, you know I was absent), did he continue a devotion which must end in suffering and disappointment to you? There is a vicious vanity and selfishness in this, most unmanly and detestable. Do not think, dearest Bessie, that I am anxious to prove him unworthy—Alas, alas! I was far too slow to believe him so; and I now only set before you these inevitable inferences from his conduct, in the hope that your illusion will sooner vanish, and you will the sooner recover your tranquility.
“I am writing without a ray of light, except what comes from the embers on the hearth. Perhaps you will think I am in Egyptian mental darkness. No, Bessie, I must be clear-sighted 78when I have nothing in view but your honour and happiness. They shall ever be my care, even more than my own. But why do I separate that which is one and indivisible? Good-night, dear sister. Let me fancy you listening to me; your sweet eye fixed on me; no dejected nor averted look; your face beaming, as I have often seen it, with the tenderness so dangerous here, so safe in heaven; the hope so often defeated here, there ever brightening; the joy so transient here, there enduring!—Let me see this blessed vision, and I shall sleep sweetly and sweetly dream of home.
“Ever thine, Bessie,
“E. L.”
Bessie read her brother’s letter with mixed emotions. At first it called forth tenderness for him; then she thought he judged Meredith precipitately, harshly even; and after confirming herself in this opinion, by thinking of him over and over again in the false lights in which he had shown himself, she said, “even Eliot allows that we can neither give nor withhold our love; then how is Jasper to blame for not giving it to one so humble, so inferior as I am? and how could I withhold mine?” Poor Bessie! it is a common trick of human nature to snatch from an argument whatever coincides with our own views, and leave the rest. “If,” she continued in her reflections, “he had ever made any declarations, or asked any confessions—but I gave my whole heart unasked and silently.” She could have recalled passionate declarations in his eye, prayers in his devotion; but her love had the essential characteristics of true passion; it was humble, generous, and self-condemning.
79CHAPTER VII.
“Si tout le monde vous ressembloit, un roman
seroit bientôt fini!”—MOLIERE.
November’s leaden clouds and fitful gleams of sunshine, coming like visitations of heaven-inspired thoughts, and vanishing, alas! like illusions, harmonized with the state of Bessie’s mind. She was much abroad, rambling alone over her favourite haunts, and living over the dangerous past. This was at least a present relief and solace; and her mother, though she feared it might minister to the morbid state of her child’s feelings, had not the resolution to interpose her authority to prevent it. Bessie was one evening at twilight returning homeward by a road (if road that might be called which was merely a horse-path) that communicated at the distance of a mile and a half with the main road to Boston. It led by the margin of a little brook, through a pine wood that was just now powdered over with a light snow. Meredith and Bessie had always taken their way through this sequestered wood in their walks and rides, going and returning; not a step of it but was eloquent with some treasured word, some well-remembered emotion. Bessie had seated herself on a fallen trunk, an accustomed resting-place, and was looking at a bunch of ground pine and wild periwinkles as if she were perusing them; the sensations of happier hours had stolen over her, the painful present and uncertain future were forgotten, when she was roused from her dreamy state by the trampling 80of an approaching horse. Women, most women, are cowards on instinct. Bessie cast one glance backward, and saw the horse was ridden by a person in a military dress. A stranger in this private path was rather an alarming apparition, and she started homeward with hasty steps. The rider mended his horse’s pace, and was soon even with her, and in another instant had dismounted and exclaimed—“Bessie Lee!—It is you, Bessie—I cannot be mistaken!”
Bessie smiled at this familiar salutation, and did not refuse her hand to the stranger, who with eager cordiality offered his; but not being in the least a woman of the world, it was plain she explored his face in vain for some recognisable feature.—“No, you do not remember me—that is evident,” he said, with a tone of disappointment. “Is there not a vestige, Bessie, of your old playmate, in the whiskered, weather-beaten personage before you?”
“Herbert Linwood!” she exclaimed, and a glow of glad recognition mounted from her heart to her cheek.
“Ah, thank you, Bessie, better late than never; but it is sad to be forgotten. You are much less changed than I, undoubtedly; but I should have known you if nothing were unaltered save the colour of your eye; however, I have always worn your likeness here,” he gallantly added, putting his hand to his heart, “and in truth, you are but the opening bud expanded to the flower, while I have undergone a change like the chestnut, from the tassel to the bearded husk.” Bessie soon began to perceive familiar tones and expressions, and she consoled Herbert with the assurance that it was only her surprise, his growth, change of dress, &c., that prevented her from knowing him at once. They soon passed to mutual inquiries, by which it appeared that Herbert had come to Massachusetts on military business. The visit to Westbrook was a little episode of his own insertion. He was to return in a few weeks 81to West Point, where he was charmed to hear he should meet Eliot.
“I am cut off from my own family,” he said, “and really, I pine for a friend. I gather from Belle’s letters that my father is more and more estranged from me. While he thought I was fighting on the losing side, and in peril of my head, his generous spirit was placable; but since the result of our contest has become doubtful, even to him, he has waxed hotter and hotter against me; and if we finally prevail, and prevail we must, he will never forgive me.”
“Oh, do not say so—he cannot be so unrelenting; and if he were, Isabella can persuade him—she can do any thing she pleases.”
“Yes, a pretty potent person is that sister of mine. But when my father sets his foot down, the devil—I beg your pardon Bessie, and Belle’s too—I mean his metal is of such a temper that an angel could not bend him.”
“Isabella is certainly the angel, not its opposite.”
“Why yes, she is, God bless her! But yet, Bessie, she is pretty well spiced with humanity. If she were not, she would not be so attractive to a certain friend of ours, who is merely human.”
Bessie’s heart beat quicker; she knew, or feared she knew, what Herbert meant; and after a pause, full of sensation to her, she ventured to ask “if he heard often from New-York?”
“Yes, we get rumours from there every day—nothing very satisfactory. Belle, in spite of her toryism, is a loving sister, and writes me as often as she can; but as the letters run the risk of being read by friends and foes, they are about as domestic and private as if they were endited for Rivington’s Gazette.”
“Then,” said Bessie, quite boldly, for she felt a sensible relief, “you have no news to tell me?”
82“No—no, nothing official,” he replied, with a smile; “Belle writes exultingly of Meredith having, since his return to New-York, come out on the right side, as she calls it—a
nd of my father’s pleasure and pride in him, &c. Of course she says not a word of her own sentiments. I hear from an old friend of mine, who was brought in a prisoner the other day, that Meredith has been devoted to her ever since his return. They were always lovers after an April-day fashion, you know, Bessie, and I should not be surprised to hear of their engagement at any time—should you?”
Fortunately for poor Bessie, her hood sheltered the rapid mutations of her cheek; resolution or pride she had not, but a certain sense of maidenly decorum came to her aid, and she faintly answered, “No, I should not.” If this were a slight departure from truth, every woman (every young one) will forgive her, for it was a case of self-preservation. Linwood was so absorbed in the happiness of being near her, of having her arm in his, that he scarcely noticed how that arm trembled, and how her voice faltered. He afterward recalled it.
Herbert’s visit to the Lees was like a saint’s day to good Catholics after a long penance. He had in his boyhood been a prime favourite with Mrs. Lee—she was delighted to see him again, and thought the man even more charming than the boy. She made every effort to show off her hospitable home to Linwood in its old aspect of abundance and cheerfulness; and, in spite of war and actual changes, she succeeded. She had the skilful housewife’s gift “to make the worse appear the better,”—far more difficult in housewifery than in metaphysics. Herbert enjoyed, to her kind heart’s content, the result of her efforts. The poor fellow’s appetite had been so long mortified with the sorry fare of the American camp, that no Roman epicurean ever relished the dainties of an emperor’s table (such as canaries’ eyes and peacocks’ brains) more keenly than he did the plain but excellent provisions at Lee 83farm; the incomparable bread and butter, ham, apple-sauce, and cream, the nuts the children cracked, and the sparkling cider they drew for him. We are quite aware that a hero on a sentimental visit should be indifferent to these gross matters, but our friend Herbert was no hero, no romantic abstraction, but a good, honest, natural fellow, compounded of body and spirit, each element bearing its due proportion in the composition.
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