THE TUTOR’S WARD. A NOVEL.
BY THE AUTHOR OF “WAYFARING SKETCHES,” “USE AND ABUSE,” ETC.
“Implora eterna pace.”
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON: COLBURN AND CO., PUBLISHERS, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
1851.
THE life of almost every human being is governed by one master thought—the life, we
say, of human beings, not human vegetables, of which many flourish in our soil, making a very
goodly show, notwithstanding their respectable unconsciousness of all but their material
existence. Every thinking mortal has a sovereign thought, to which all others are subservient.
Sometimes its nature causes it to be as a guardian angel to the man, one that walks, serene
and bright, side by side with his soul through the tempests and the turmoil of life; on
through the dark valley where the
Sometimes its mission seems to be that of a demon, and its foul presence follows the spirit through the glittering joys and the sunshine of life on to the dark valley—and—with what a dread power beyond it, perhaps!
Now, the thought which had ruled the life and soul of John Forde for many years past, looked
very like an angel, not only long ago when it was clothed with the beauty and brightness of
hope, but even now when it came in its mourning garments to brood over his heart that was as
the grave of a dream long dead. It was angel‐like still—for what is so bright or so fair of
all the fair things of earth, as sweet human love? and it was all the more lovely to his soul
that it had been so vain. We know how much more beautiful in death the treasures seem to grow
which we have cherished for their living beauty. Yes, the deep love which was the master
thought of
What a strange, dreamy‐looking individual he seemed as he sat there gazing intently on the
fire which he had forgotten to replenish, and watching how the flame appeared to feed even
upon the ashes. There was a strong likeness between himself and his Newfoundland dog, who was
also engaged in a meditative manner in looking at the dying embers; the expression and the
colour of their eyes was at least precisely the same, and the resemblance was height‐
He was very tall and ungainly, his great ill‐shaped hands and feet seemed not to fit him
properly, and his head was set uncomfortably on his shoulders. He was wont to go about the
world as if he could not conceive for what reason he had been brought into it. He lived quite
alone, holding no intercourse with any one, and seeking the acquaintance of none: to all
appearance he had no occupation whatever, and he seemed always half asleep. In reality,
however, he had a most engrossing employment, which absorbed him entirely. From morning till
night did he sit day‐dreaming, weaving golden visions of an impossible joy—none knew better
than himself how impossible it was; but that bright ideal was all that life could give him of
happiness now, and he learnt to lose himself in these glowing fancies so completely, that he
had well nigh forgotten the truth of his existence.
It was strange to what an extent his abstraction from the things of sense had arrived; he was scarce conscious of external circumstances, and long habit had so increased his power of imagination, that he would carry on the same series of ideal scenes for days together, living over again in his dreams by night what he fancied in his visions of the day, and only waking from them to give a sort of sobbing sigh for their untruth, and then straightway relapsing into their false enchantment.
He had lived for the last ten years in his
Previously to this event, John Forde had been private tutor in a family of much respectability.
The night was chill and dark, for it was late in the month of October, and wild gusts of
wind and rain drove past the windows, whilst the decaying light upon the hearth served only to
render the room more cheerless; but although the great dog occasionally looked wistfully round
when the blast howled with increasing violence, John Forde seemed unconscious of all that was
passing; his bodily presence was there, but his soul was far away. The song of summer birds
was in his ears, the scent of summer flowers in the air,
Suddenly, as he sat there, the bell of the outer door was rung, apparently by an impatient
hand; for it sent a quick, sharp peal through the house. John started involuntarily; he had
literally not a friend in the world, so far as he knew at least, and it was
What was there in that step, so heavy and uncertain, that brought back to him with vivid
startling power the remembrance of a day—one of the gladdest in his life—when bounding along
the green grass with feet light as the fleetest fawn, he had seen a bright form come dancing
towards him, and the sweet ringing voice that now for ever was echoing deep in his soul,
called him gaily to come with her far into the woods, where she feared to stray alone? What
was there in the footfall on the stairs that night which
His hands grasped the table for support; his head turned round mechanically, his eyes fixed
themselves upon the door; some one had paused behind it; he could hear the quick breathing,
the deep‐drawn sigh, as if the person were utterly exhausted; a hand was placed upon the lock;
he verily expected to see a ghost come in, and was it not a ghost which entered? The ghost of
youth, and hope, and beauty, the ghost of a life that had been so full of promise, and now was
perishing in such dark night. It was a woman of some thirty years of age. She looked as if she
had just arisen from her dying bed; and so in truth she had. Her face was ghastly livid, the
fever spot burning on her cheek, and the cold dew gathering on her brow. It seemed
extraordinary that she should have had strength to come there. She had been beautiful—how
beautiful the throbbing heart of poor John Forde could
Yet he knew her at once. It was more than ten years since he had looked upon that face, but still had he not seen it in his dreams every day, nay, every hour? He saw no change in her; he only felt it was herself; he saw not that some terrible disease was killing her—that some strange event must have brought her there at such an hour—that some great agony must have nerved her to leave her couch of sickness and come hither through the dark night with the tempest raging round her; he thought nothing of all this; he forgot all, save that he saw before him the living reality of that fair image which was the star of all his visions.
He forgot who she was, and what he was himself, and all the changes which these ten years
had wrought for her, if not for him. He forgot that his dreams were dreams, and he thought
that the truth had
And she answered with her sobs, deep, bursting sobs, that seemed as if they would have
carried away the little life that still was lingering in her sinking frame. She wept for that
faithful love, so despised and so rejected—for her own past scorn in the pride of her
happiness. She wept for the days that were to come no more, when her heart was so full of hope
she had no thought for his despair, when the love she had chosen from the many hearts offered
to
He bounded towards her, but his feet were powerless to support him, so bewil‐
“Do not leave me!” he gasped out. “Oh, you know not what days and nights I have passed
waiting for this hour—you know not the chill and the gloom of this world without you. I
deserve that you should stay with me, if ever patient, longing, and bitter watching by the
grave of the past where your image lay entombed, and such faithfulness of heart as chose this
solitude with one deep thought of you, rather than all the pleasures life could give, deserved
compassion! Do not leave me! It cannot be that any human heart should be so cruel as thus to
come and thus to pass away.” His words were incoherent, as he poured forth his entreaties, but
She bent over him with a look intensely mournful, and murmured soothingly, “My poor John—my poor, faithful friend!”
She did not remember that once before she had uttered these words in his heating, these very
words. It was on the morning of her wedding day;—as she came down the stairs in her bridal
dress to enter the carriage that was to take her to the church,—her eye caught a glimpse of
the pale, tear‐stained face of the poor, despised tutor, whose mad and pertinacious attachment
to herself had hitherto only called forth her scorn and even ridicule. He was cowering down
amongst the crowd of servants and dependents who had assembled to see her pass; he had hid
himself behind them, that, unnoticed in this his bitter hour, he might look for the last time
on the face of his worshipped idol—
He was there shivering from head to foot, his hands clasped tightly over his heaving breast,
his head bent forward, and his eyes, through gushing tears, fixing on the young bride their
most wistful gaze; for the first time she was touched. She had ever treated him with the
utmost haughtiness and contempt, but she could not look unmoved on this extremity of anguish.
Perhaps some sympathetic chord was wakened by the latent power of suffering not yet developed
in her own young heart; but whatever prompted her, as she passed him walking over the
They brought back the truth to his bewildered mind; the mists and the clouds which his long
habit of visionary life had gathered on his spirit, seemed to clear away as that voice came
sounding on his ear; the utter confusion which her sudden appearance had caused in his
thoughts, passed suddenly from him. He knew and remembered all. He raised himself up, and with
a shaking hand brushed the tears from his eyes, and then he looked on her; he saw and
understood who she was. These many years she had been the wife of another man, of one whom she
had loved as he loved her!
She sighed heavily. “Yes, it is even so, it is I—myself; but the hour is passing, and my time is short, how short, alas! alas! in every way. I came here with an earnest purpose, and it must be fulfilled, and I have little strength, and much, so much to say; will you listen, patiently, my good, dear, John, as in that happy, olden time?”
“Oh, Millicent, Millicent!” he said, and trembled violently.
“Do you remember,“ she went on, with a smile more sad than ever dying sunbeam on a fading autumn sky, “you called me your queen in those bright days! and all I ever wished for was done by you, almost before I knew my own thoughts had desired it.”
“And so it shall be still,” he said. “All that I was to you when we last met, I still must be, not now alone, but ever while I live and breathe. I am unchanged, most miserable that I am, unchanged!”
“I knew it,” she answered, sadly; “some instinct told me so, but I must tell you why I came, and my strength is failing. There is One waiting for me who will admit of no delay. And Death himself must not stop the words upon my lips till you have heard my one petition and granted it, if for the dying woman you indeed can feel what once was felt for the blooming girl; sit there,” she continued, “and I must be at your feet, for I am come a suppliant.”
He took the chair to which she pointed, apparently scarce knowing what he did, for
THE firelight gleamed on the face of the dying woman as she sat there, and showed
how very near death she really was. She had fortified herself with some powerful stimulant for
this exertion, but it was clear that its effect would not last long; she had taken off her
bonnet, and her hair falling loosely round her denoted that she had risen in much haste from
her sick bed. The large cloak with which she had sought to screen herself from the wind and
rain was of some coarse material, evidently
She sat leaning her head on her hand; looking up into his face with her mournful eyes—mournful as are only the eyes of the dying, or of those who, living, weep that they have not died more utterly to all the evil they abhor. The sight of John Forde seemed to have recalled so many memories of her happy youth, that when she spoke it was musingly, as though she were but communing with herself.
“How true it has all proved, how strangely, sadly true—your words have proved, dear father!
You said we had no right to take our life into our own hands and say, ‘I am free; I will make
of it what I please. I will play what game with it I will—it is for myself alone. I will seek
happiness in my own way, and if I fail I alone shall suffer.’ You said, one might perhaps with
impunity risk suffering, but not sin,—and I risked both and have escaped from neither; poor
father, you strove to struggle then with my heart’s deep love—you might as well have striven
to fathom or to stem the wild waters of the sea. You said that noble, talented, fair to all
eyes, as was my lover, William Grey, it never would prosper me to be his wife; for that he was
one who scoffed at holy things, who only sought to drink deep draughts of this life’s
pleasure, whose heart was full of idols—and himself unto himself the chief. You said that none
could touch the burning flame and
“John, I would not have you think I love him, my husband, less than in that hour when I told
my poor, fond father, in all the pride of my rebellious, selfish will, that I would be his
wife, or never that of mortal man. No, I will say, as you said even now, I am unchanged, most
miserable that I am, unchanged; nor yet would I have you think he led me wilfully to any evil.
My outward life has been unstained and bright; the world will tell you I have been a blameless
wife and mother, most assiduous in my little pleasing duties, most courteous, most benevolent;
and it is very true—I have been all this, and more—I never injured any, I
She had spoken these last sentences in a dreamy, musing tone, rolling herself to and fro as
if in pain, and John Forde sat listening to her with large tears, of which he was all
unconscious, stealing down his cheeks; her voice was so very sad, so like to the rise and fall
of the sighing wind on
The mother started at the sound, as if a voice had called her angrily; her pale cheek crimsoned; her eye sparkled with a sudden energy; she clasped her hands like one who asks forgiveness.
“My child, my child! that any thought of other days, that any memory of departed hope, sweet though it be, should lead me to forget how on this hour hangs your whole life’s destiny! Alas, to think that one could be so weak as thus to sit dreaming by the side of her own yawning grave!” She turned and raised herself so that she was almost kneeling before him.
“John, I need not tell you that I am sinking under a mortal disease—that the grasp of death
is tightening on my heart most rapidly—that a few days must terminate my life. It is therefore
the petition of a dying woman that I beseech of you to
“I took pleasure in that society; I made my joy and my delight in that brilliant life of
gaiety for many years; I never thought of looking what depths might be beneath that sparkling
surface; I never thought of saying to my spirit, Is all well with thee? art thou ready when
the dark‐winged angel comes? But at last he did come whose office is to strip the covering of
beauty from all deceitful things. Death came, and then I learnt to know what I had been so
long, and am. I must not tell you of myself—he leaves me not the time. I must not tell you all
that I would give to stand once more beside you as I stood upon my wedding morning, a bride,
not yet a wife; knowing so little evil, an innocent girl in an honourable, quiet home, with
that good old father warding off unhallowed things. How would I tear away the bridal veil, and
fling aside the
“Oh, John, dear John, my agony was very great for many days, and then the thought of you
came like a sunbeam to my soul—of you, my faithful, truest friend; for you must save her, you
must take her,
She had spoken with such exceeding vehemence, her abrupt and rapid utterance had gained such energy from the fever raging in her veins, that now the false strength went from her utterly: she sank down breathless, panting, and exhausted.
As for John Forde, his whole frame was shaking with emotion; that she should have been so
wretched, that she should come praying to him for succour, that she should doubt his
willingness to die for her—all these thoughts filled his heart to bursting, and he could not
speak. At length she lifted up her face; she knew not what his silence meant, and the anguish
of suspense was most unbearable. Her countenance showed that the exertions of
“Speak—say—will you—will you grant my prayer, and save my child?” She joined her hands, and lifted them in supplication; “for the sake of the dear love wherewith you loved me in brighter days!”
The look which he gave her was describable; there was in it such a world of unutterable affection, of mournful reproach, of anguish for her suffering most intense, but because of the very depth and strength of the feelings struggling in his heart, his answer was very simple, “Are you not, Millicent?”
It was enough, quite enough; she rose at once, and going to the sofa she knelt down beside
her child and laid her pale brow, damp with the dews of death, upon the little, soft hands
folded in that sleep of guilelessness; and then no sound was heard
“I am so feeble, I think death is at hand, and the little strength I have, must now be given
to take me home; they must not know I ever left it. I said I would be alone, that I wished to
sleep a few hours quietly; I bade them come again at midnight, and so they went, and I stole
softly out and came on wandering hither. Thankful I am I came to find such peace—oh, thankful
as no words can say; but now I must return, that they may find me when they come—her they will
not find, and never shall. Oh, joy unspeakable!—Her old nurse is below, a faithful creature,
whom I trust entirely; she loves me well, and she will go with you wherever you may take my
child. She will tell you all, better far than I can now. My words must be few, for he is
devouring the breath upon my lips; say once again,
And he answered at once, “To‐morrow!” but as he saw her raise those eyes so peaceful, now
that they were beautiful once more, with a long, fixed gaze of thankfulness, and then move
slowly to depart, he suddenly rose with convulsive energy from his place. His breath came
thick and fast from his labouring chest, his eyes were wild with their look of terror. The
concentrated anguish of that moment could scarcely find vent in words; he only said,
“Millicent, do not go,” but he grasped her arm at the same time with a strength of which he
was unconscious. She saw at once, that unless she had power to overcome his overwhelming
emotion, a scene would ensue which must kill her; gently she took his hand, calmly she looked
into his face, and the mild gaze of her dear eyes soothed him. Softly she spoke in a low,
sweet voice, “John, I know it is a sad thing for you that I should go, very sad that I should
die, but you have
He had never disobeyed her, nor did he now, but there are no words to say what that obedience cost him. He looked on her and smiled; her own face brightened strangely as she met his gaze—she stooped till her cold lips touched his hand, then pointed to the sleeping child, and so going forth she left them both and went her way. He never looked upon her face again.
A SUMMER’S evening in Provence—what a bright, sweet vision these words bring up
before the memory of those who know that smiling land! such a breathless, cloudless beauty
over earth and sky, such a softness in the breeze that steals along, wandering to find the
orange flowers and rob them of their fragrance; such a brightness in the lingering of the
sunset and in the dawning of the moon and stars, and over all so calm and soothing a repose;
an intensity of rest
Millicent Grey had never known another home; at least she remembered none save this, and
every object which surrounded her was most familiar; her great, restless eyes, sparkling with
the first ardour of youth and hope, went ranging impatiently from side to side as if in search
of something new. At last she turned and fixed them on the old French bonne who sat in state
before her as
“Oh, Nanette, Nanette,—how I wish you would change your face!”
“Ma chérie!” said the old woman in
“Because it is always the same face, every day the same, it never tells me anything new—nothing ever does; everything goes on the same.”
“Ah bien, mais que veux tu? I would do anything to amuse you, but as to this —” She shrugged her shoulders with a comical grimace.
“No, no,” said Millicent, putting her arms round her. “I was joking, good Nanette, I would not change your dear, old face, not even if I could, I lave it much too well—no—but I know what I do wish,” she added, with a sigh.
“And what is it?” asked Nanette, “sure you shall have it if it is not quite so impossible as the last.”
“That I am sure it is,” said Millicent, “so I need not think about it; but what I should
like would be that some one should come here, some one very grave and wise and good,—some one
from England, I fancy
“And what would you ask?” said Nanette.
“What would I ask? Oh, everything; there is so much that bewilders and confuses me. I want
to find out the meaning of the whole world, and the reason and purpose of all that goes on in
it. You do not understand me, Nanette, and I do not think I quite understand myself; but I go
living here all alone, so to speak, from day to day with such strange, restless thoughts
working in me, that I scarce can bear it. Uncle Forde never talks to me, and I know all you
could tell me, Nanette dear, which is not much; and everything I read and see only shows me
the outward surface, it tells me that things are so, such life and death, and joy and sorrow,
but it never tells me
“And why should you, my mignonne? At
“You liked singing and dancing as well as I do now, did you not, chère Nanette? Well, but one cannot dance and sing all one’s life; one did not come into the world for that alone, because then what would be the use of all the old, stiff people. Now, that is precisely what puzzles me, that is the very first question I should like to ask my wise man if he would only come; I want to know what we are all living for! What is the use of life? What are we to do with it now we have got it?”
“Ah bien,” said Nanette, looking quite bewildered; “and what does every one do with it?”
“What do they do with it? Why, they eat, and they drink, and they sleep, and they take a great deal of trouble to keep themselves alive now they are living, but then I say, what for? pourquoi? what is the use of living only to keep ourselves alive?”
“Sais‐je moi,” said Nanette, shrugging her shoulders; “but no, my petite, we do more than eating and sleeping; look, I am knitting!”
“Very well, so you are; now then, let us analyze the knitting. I am not going to touch it, don’t be afraid, I am only going to pull it morally to pieces. This piece of knitting, what is it?”
“Why, a stocking, and that is very useful, I am sure; it will keep my feet warm.”
“Yes, but you are obliged to keep your feet warm, because you are alive; you don’t live to keep your feet warm.”
This sort of reasoning was quite bewildering to Nanette: she looked comically at her work
for a few minutes as if she ought to be disgusted with it, but its hold on her affections was
far too firm. She gave a careless smile, seeming to intimate that, however unworthy, her
knitting must ever be dear to her, and taking it up again, plied her needles vigorously.
Millicent went on, “It is the same in everything; now when M. le
“Ah, poor M. Le Roux!” said Nanette, deprecatingly.
“Bien! but there was also young Adolphe, who was thrown from his horse and killed; what a state every one was in about him, how they all said it was such a misfortune, such a fine young man, any one could have been better spared; but what did M. Adolphe ever do, excepting play billiards and try to valser à deux temps? What was the good of his living? What was the use of him?”
“My dear,” said Nanette, imposingly, with the air of a person who is sure of her position; “the père André has often told me nothing was ever made without a use.”
“Then I wish some one would tell me my use,” said Millicent, with a sigh; “for here I go on eating and sleeping and living, for no purpose that I can see.”
“I will tell you what,” said Nanette, briskly; “the use of living is that we may be happy, which we could not be unless we were alive. I am sure it is that; I am convinced of ”
“Well, I could understand, that,” ex‐
She turned suddenly, and raising her bright young face, to which some earnest thought had given a look of gravity quite foreign to her usual expression, she said, in a low tone:—
“Nanette, I am certain of this; there
Nanette stooped to kiss her fondly, and then smoothing the flowing hair that shaded the young girl’s face, she said:—
“I cannot bear that you should not know everything you want to know, my darling. Why don’t you ask M. Forde? Perhaps he could tell you. He must surely grow very wise, sitting so silent, thinking all day long. It makes me go to sleep to look at him; so he must be very leaned, for I always go to sleep when I read a grave book. I should ask him, if I were you; perhaps he could explain it all.”
“Perhaps he could,” said Millicent, thoughtfully. “It is worth the trial, at all events. I will go to him.”
She returned the embrace of the old bonne with warm affection, and bounding across the garden, entered the house: then very gently and quietly she opened the door, and stole into the room where she knew she should find her guardian.
His hands folded on his knee, his eyes fixed, his bead drooping on his breast, John Forde sat in exactly the same attitude as we saw him fourteen years before, when the dying mother of the young girl who now stood by his side, came, in her last extremity, to implore the succour of him she had so despised.
The singular plan which she had adopted in order to save her child from that most unnatural
misfortune, a father’s evil influence, had been strangely successful; at least, in so far as
that Millicent Grey had been conveyed from England the very next day, and had remained at Aix
ever since, without having held the slightest communication with Mr. Grey. The letter which
Mrs. Grey had written to Mrs. Egerton, her half‐sister, on behalf of the child over whom she
could watch no more, had produced its full effect, as she expected. Mrs. Egerton was not a
person to lend her assistance willingly to any project that looked romantic, or to burden
herself
Whatever might have been Mrs. Egerton’s motives, however, she was determined rigidly
Thus John Forde remained perfectly unmolested with his young charge; and no change whatever had occurred in their position since the first day that he established himself at Aix with the little infant whom he diplomatically called his niece.
For the first few years he imagined himself exonerated from making any attempt to educate
her. He left her entirely to the motherly care of Nanette, who had replaced the English nurse
soon after their arrival, and only took measures every day to ascertain that she was alive,
and likely to live. He had recourse to various extraordinary expedients in order to convince
himself of this fact, sometimes making the most horrible grimaces, in order that the
frightened child might attest to the strength of her lungs by loud screams of terror, or else
giving vent to an unearthly howl, that he might have the comfort of seeing her run vigorously
away. With some one such effort made every day he acquitted himself to his own satisfaction of
his duties as guardian for a considerable time. At last, however, several startling remarks
made by Millicent began to awaken him to the fact that she was fast advancing out of infancy,
and that it was absolutely necessary to give her some instruction. It was now that John was
sorely perplexed;
Soon after, he was also further relieved from his responsibility by the intervention of a
very clever and amiable French lady, whose little daughter was Millicent’s playmate, and who,
compassionating the neglected condition of the clever English child, proposed to John that his
niece should take lessons along with her own little girls from the various masters whose
services she considered necessary. He was too happy to agree to this plan, and the result
A fitting teacher truly, in the faith of an immortal soul, would John Forde have been, who
had never known any other worship save the idolatry of heart wherewith he bowed himself before
the creature of clay; for it mattered not what he professed himself—of professors we have
enough; and very fair and angel‐like this race of man
There were several standard works which gave her the various doctrines in their regular
order; and he had found her so apt a scholar, when he instructed her in the rudiments of
chemistry and astronomy, that he doubted not she would learn religion without much trouble. He
taught it to her as a species of moral mathematics; and so soon as she was thoroughly
conversant with the leading principles—accurate in her knowledge of
To Millicent Grey it was therefore what it is to three parts of the world, an abstract
theory, which had no more to do with the hidden life of her spirit, than those astronomical
calculations in which she was often engaged, and a matter as completely external from herself
as the code of virtues which she was taught to admire in the heathen philosophers of old. Like
the millions who have gone before her and the millions who will come after, she treated it usa
manual of useful knowledge not likely to be immediately in requisition, and therefore to be
laid aside with much respect till such time as she should reach the Gate of the Tomb, when it
would serve as a passport to that other life in which she duly believed, and of which she
never thought. It is not
Youth has a faith and a worship of its own; the worship is the adoration of happiness, and they imagine this god of their idolatry to be enthroned among the sunny bowers of this world, which is so beautiful, so sorrowful, (but beautiful only to their trusting innocence,) little dreaming that a mild, pure angel, distant as angels are, it wanders even now in far greener pastures. The faith is in life, this mortal life in which they believe as containing the sure promise of all the joy which their imagination pictures, and for which their living spirit craves.
It was so with Millicent Grey; there was a restlessness in that fresh untamed nature, a
questioning in that warm, loving heart, a
And so the bright‐eyed, sunny‐hearted girl stole up to the old, way‐worn man and stood looking at him. John Forde was still the same weary traveler into the unattainable regions of the past, the same hapless dweller in a land of shadows; day by day and night by night had only witnessed the deepening madness of his soul.
One would have thought that when his idol crumbled into dust he would have ceased to worship
it, but it was not so. When the news of her death first reached him, he was stunned and
bewildered, like a man stricken with sudden blindness. Her ideal presence, in which he had so
long dwelt, had been to him all in all; he had learnt to concentrate therein every joy of
which the various faculties of the heart are
The spirit cannot rest on vacancy, and this mental solitude was unendurable; he knew not
where to turn for relief; shut out from that enchanted land where he had taught his soul to
dwell more fondly than it would have done perhaps in joys that were real, he seemed lost in
some dark immensity. For days and nights he wandered about like one beside himself, seeming as
though his wild, staring eyes were ever in search of some lost treasure. At length utterly
exhausted with the very bewilderment of his sorrow,
And when he awoke from this sweet vision, he could not bear to part from it. He buried his
face in his hands and went on dreaming, and soon he found that for his strange, ideal life, it
mattered little whether the image, which was the sun in that world of his creation, were the
phantom likeness of one living and absent, or of a cold and coffined corpse. Where all was
most unreal, the actual truth could have no influence, and his imagination could lift her out
of her dark grave, rigid and helpless as she was, and deck her mouldering form in hues of
youth and health, filling her marble hands with the flowers she was wont to love, as easily as
once it drew her from her husband’s side
From that hour he relapsed into his former visionary state, and the excess of this mental enjoyment seems to have deadened his other faculties completely. He lived as though he were a stranger among men, having no share in the common existence. He was ever listening so intently to the sweet voice murmuring deep within his soul, that most often he heard naught of what was passing round him; and the one image on which his longing eyes were ever fixed, shut out from his sight all things more palpable and real.
Millicent had stood by his side sometime quite unobserved, gazing at him with her bright,
restless eyes. Of all the problems which life seemed to offer for her great bewilderment, none
was so completely inexplicable to her as the existence of John Forde. The knitting of
stockings did give a certain interest to Nanette’s life, but her strange, old uncle had not
even the excitement of
“Dear uncle, please to wake up: I want to speak to you.”
Millicent was somewhat of a spoilt child. John Forde had never dreamt of controlling her,
and Nanette had but one wish in the world, which was to see her look happy. The good little
woman would have put herself to the extremest torture rather than have darkened, in any way,
the smile upon the sunny face she loved so well. Fortunately,
“Would you try to hear me only for one moment? There is something I want so very much to know, and I have no one but yourself to ask, or indeed I would not trouble you.”
Millicent was really in earnest, and there was something plaintive in the tone of her voice which stung him with a sort of remorse. He roused himself at once.
“My dear child, tell me all you would say. You are not unhappy, Millicent; surely, surely
you are not unhappy! What should I do, most wretched that I am, if there were any sorrow in
your heart? She said
“No, no! do not look distressed, dear uncle; how wrong I was to disturb you so. I am not
unhappy! I do not well know what sorrow means, only I have been bewildered about many things
of late, and you are so wise I am sure you can explain them all. I will tell you how it is. I
am passing out of childhood now, and I feel that the days are flitting on without my having
found out for what purpose they are given me. Until now I have been happy whenever the day was
bright and the sunbeams sparkling, when the birds were merry and the flowers blooming; and
only sad and weary when the rain came down and crushed my poor, sweet blossoms to the ground,
and sent the nightingales all fluttering to their nests. But now I feel somehow that there
must be another sunshine for our lives than only the sunshine of the sky; my mind is restless,
and I know not why. I have a wish, a longing, and I cannot tell
“Alas, my child,” said John, as he stroked her waving hair, “and can it be that already you are seeking that which men chase from the cradle to the grave, that unattainable—the spirit’s rest!”
“The spirit’s rest!” said Millicent, while a sort of fear crept over her, she knew not why. “Uncle, what is that?”
“It is the good which all are seeking, and I know not if any find. I can but tell, I sought
and found it not, long ago, Millicent, when all my thoughts were not devoured by one thought,
and all my mind was not absorbed by one idea. I could have told you of the various shapes in
which this desire of all hearts appears to human eyes, and how men struggle panting after it,
“And where did you seek it, then?” said Millicent, with a trembling voice.
“In her love!” he answered, almost fiercely. He gazed for a moment fixedly into vacancy, then, pushing her from him, buried his face in his hands.
“Child, child, why have you come to awaken me out of that enchantment, the very surpassing
sweetness of whose delusion makes the knowledge of its falsity so bitter? Why have you come to
remind me that it was a shipwreck truly, and that the ocean of vain delights on which I seek
to keep that shattered bark afloat does hide indeed most hideous depths, where I must sink and
be engulfed one day. Go—what can I do for you? If the universal restlessness has
Millicent dared not further trouble him; she crept away far more thoughtful than
She had gathered from it this conviction, that the repose in which her whole being was to
rest, and be as it were absorbed, the mysterious repose for which her spirit craved with a
longing that deepened every day, was to be found in
Thus Millicent Grey prepared to begin life with one great mistake.
SOME three years later a letter arrived one morning at the house Rue St. Michel, in
the bonne ville d’Aix, where Millicent Grey had dwelt for so long a period. It was one of no
small importance to her, for it announced the death of her father, and further contained the
request, or rather the commands, of Mrs. Egerton that she should forthwith repair under
suitable escort to England, there to take up her abode in the family of her aunt, according to
the request of her dying mother.
There was now, however, an additional reason for such an arrangement, as Mr. Egerton had by this event become her lawful guardian, which John Forde was not. Mr. Grey, remembering on his deathbed the child on whom he had bestowed no thought in life, had sent for his brother‐in‐law, and entreated him to repair somewhat of his own neglect towards his daughter by undertaking the care of her and her fortune, at least until she should be of age. Mr. Egerton therefore added a few lines to his wife’s letter, to say that she would be expected as soon as possible at Rookcliffe, his country residence in ——shire.
In compliance with these instructions Millicent Grey found herself, on a fine evening in the month of May, after a rapid journey through France, on board of the steamer which was to convey her from Hâvre to London.
John Forde was not with her—he could not have accompanied her to her uncle’s
Millicent herself wept much at parting with him. She kissed his unresisting hands again and again, and almost felt as if the delight of going at last to visit this wonderful world, of which she had dreamt so long, were sadly lessened by the separation from her childhood’s guardian.
Yet Nanette remarked, somewhat maliciously, that her tears flowed quite as freely when they
passed the grande statue in the Plâce on their way out of the town. In fact, at Millicent’s
age, and with her loving disposition, it was impossible for her not to attach herself to the
only person with whom she had shared her home besides her bonne,—but it could not possibly be
a deep‐rooted affection, or a lasting regret; for John Forde had been nothing in her
existence, monotonous as it was. After the first natural pang of separation was over it could
make little difference that her eyes no longer turned occasionally on
As for Nanette, despite her feeling of extreme mental helplessness after she quitted Père
André,—despite her dread of English heretics and coal fires, and her invincible horror for
some creature of her imagination which she was wont to denominate
There was the usual assemblage to‐night. There stands the young Englishman who might have
been seen, a few days since, stalking like any heathen through the prostrate groups of
kneeling worshippers in St. Peter’s, his spy‐glass in his eye; and his hands in his pockets.
At his side yawns
Further on is the brisk young clergyman, who, with his aristocratic pupil, spent two months
not long since in the Holy City, and employed the interval in falling in love with, and
marrying the daughter of a missionary there established; the sentimental preliminaries having
been carried on during an excursion to Bethlehem, and the declaration and acceptance having
taken place at the foot of the Mount of Olives, such being the
In the midst of these various indviduals it was a pleasant sight to see young Millicent
Grey, as she stood at the side of the vessel, looking over the foaming water towards the yet
unseen shores of England, braving, with child‐like pleasure, the rough visiting of the
No one was prepared to enter on the world with less idea of the consequences than Millicent
Grey; in fact, her peculiar education had been of a nature to render her well nigh incapable
of understanding the whole artificial frame‐work of society. She was essentially truthful,—it
never occurred to her to speak otherwise than she thought, although her due share of womanly
timidity and reserve prevented her from
She stood, casting her free glance over the sea, and already in imagination her bounding
feet were treading the golden plains of her ideal future,—strange! if any one had suddenly
mapped out before her eyes then, what that future was to be. Ah!
She was not long allowed to stand indulging in her brilliant fancies; the bustle of starting was just over, and the steamer fairly under way, when Nanette came rushing up to her in a state of great excitement exclaiming,—
“
“Yes,” said Millicent, “We shall be there to‐morrow. Oh, Nanette!” she added, turning round
her beaming face, “life
“My dear young lady, I sincerely hope you may not be heartily tired of it before it is done,” said a strange voice at her side. She looked round hastily, and found that the speaker was an old gentleman, supported on crutches, who had been watching her animated looks with much interest for some time past. He raised his hat courteously as her eyes met his.
“I really beg your pardon,” he said,
He was an aristocratic looking old man, who had once been handsome, but he was entirely crippled by palsy; his countenance, which was by no means unpleasing, had an expression of great firmness, accompanied by a slight degree of irritability; he looked as if he were thoroughly accustomed to have his own way in all things, and his long‐protracted state of suffering had no doubt rendered him somewhat capricious in his desires. On the whole, however, he looked thoroughly estimable and benevolent, and for the moment seemed very anxious that Millicent should not take offence at his unceremonious speech.
She hastened to assure him that such was not the case, and feeling convinced, by the sort of
freemasonry which exists in a certain class of society, that he was a
“Why, you talk of visiting England and its natives as if you were going to inquire into the manners and customs of the Chinese,” said the old man, at last, smiling at her animation.
“Well, it is pretty much like visiting China or Kamschatka, or any other foreign country, to
me. I have never been there since I was quite a little child; of course it is my native land,
and I am quite ready to
“Why, I believe there is upon the whole; and yet people do foolish things enough there. I could tell you of a few,” he added, shrugging his shoulders with a comical smile.
“Oh, I should not like it if they did not,” said Millicent; “but what I expect will prove so
instructive to me is, that I am told the English all live upon system. In France, you know,
they live
“ Well, I declare I can scarcely tell. Like M. Jourdain, who was not aware he had been
talking
“Ah, the system of making one’s self comfortable is very common in England, I believe,” said Millicent, musingly; “but now, pray excuse me for asking it, I should like so much to know why you thought I should tire of life before it was done.”
“Simply because I am very tired of it myself,” said the old gentleman, laughing; “not that I
want to be rid of it however,
Millicent gave a timid glance of inquiry, but he shook his head, smiling.
“No, really I dare not, on so short an acquaintance, make you acquainted with all the secrets of my history. Should we meet again, as I trust, or rather, to tell you the truth, as I am determined we shall, I have no doubt I should be inclined to make you wise by my past experience.”
“
Millicent and her new friend laughed heartily at Nanette’s look of horror, who clearly thought that the most serious of affairs in France was merrier than amusements in England. They continued to converse together with much satisfaction, till the arrival of a tall servant, laden with cloaks and plaids, interrupted them. He ventured to hint, that the night air was dangerous to his master, and the old gentleman was obliged to confess it was somewhat imprudent in him to remain so late on deck. He therefore took leave of Millicent with all the courtier‐like politeness of former days, and having been duly wrapped up in various mufflings, allowed himself to be carried off like a stout bundle, by the powerful footman.
We all know how speedily acquaintances are made in travelling; the frigid barriers which society raises between man and man are so completely thrown down when all are alike exposed to the same inconveniences, and it may be dangers. Who has not known what it is to swear an eternal friendship to the charming individual whose society has enlivened a ten days’ voyage in a wretched steamer, or to feel as unhappy as though one had lost one’s nearest relations, when the termination of a fortnight’s quarantine separates us from the family who shared its miseries with us? Millicent and the old gentleman met next morning as though they had been acquainted for years, and cordially shook hands with mutual pleasure.
They had a bad passage, and did not arrive at their destination until several hours beyond
the usual time, There was considerable confusion on board, and the tall servant was fully
occupied in taking charge of numerous packages belonging to
“I have a great favour to ask, and I
Millicent was too completely ignorant of the ways of the world to imagine that there could
be any reason to prevent her doing as he wished, especially as Nanette, whose bright
imagination had already conjured up visions of splendid
ROOKCLIFFE, the future abode of Millicent Grey, lay at a distance of some five
miles from the nearest railway station, and it was late in the evening before she found
herself in the carriage which her uncle had sent to convey her over the intervening space.
Nanette, quite fatigued with the number of reverences she had made, with most unappreciated
politeness, to the stoical gentlemen in glazed hats who had handed her out and in of the
railway carriages, composed herself to sleep in a
She felt, as she had done throughout this journey, that she was being carried on to her
destiny, that she was traveling, as it were, over the first stage of life, and there was a
feeling almost of rapture in the excitement which thrilled every nerve, as she thought of the
unknown future to which she looked with such anxiety. She little knew how, somewhat later,
with most ineffable calm, we learn to lay ourselves down on the breast of that dark stream,
and, with hands all humbly crossed upon the bosom, scarred with many a half‐closed wound, let
the quick current bear us on and on, without an effort to direct its course, thinking only how
deep, and clear, and smooth is the boundless ocean, to whose placid rest it bears us rapidly.
Even the
There is at all times a strange sensation in traveling by night through a peopled country; the contrast is so great between the lucid sky, where alone the remains of light are gathered, and the dark heavy earth, seeming to lie in sullen silence beneath its pail of shadows. The sight of those huge masses of building, whence no sound arises, but which we know to be so teeming with life, sentient, suffering, and mysterious, fills us with a sense of awe and, we fain with our dim eyes would pierce the outward matter to discern what manner of spirit is within.
How awful were a voice to come forth from each one of these dark piles of habitation, and
proclaim the hidden truth of the living mysteries within, saying, “Here human love is
agonizing; there
But no such voice is heard, at least, except we question it; and so, through scenes which, could we witness them, would make us turn away heart‐sick to weep as it were tears of blood for our hapless brethren, we pass,—dreaming golden dreams, as Millicent did now!
The first mile or two carried her through a colliery district, and even in the dim light she
could discern the miserable appearance of the miners’ habitations, which were in fact but a
set of wretched hovels crowded together; their numbers were, however, so great that she
rightly estimated the population as being very considerable. A bleak common of no great extent
divided this uninviting part of the county from a tract of land where the scenery was of a
totally opposite
Even by night Millicent could distinguish some of the beauty of this scene, as the tall
trees seemed to sweep past her, assuming a thousand fantastic shapes, and often obscuring the
sky altogether with their thick branches. One object, however, before entering the wood,
attracted her attention forcibly; it was a small church,
This village being Mr. Egerton’s own property, and all these simple villagers, peering from
their lattice windows as the travellers pass, being also Mr. Egerton’s dependents, the
coachman, sympathizing with that gentleman’s feelings, now causes the well appointed carriage
to take a somewhat more aristocratic pace, and whirls it with noisy ostentation to the gate.
The woman at the lodge is all ready to give it free entrance, and she curtsies in the
It was happy and striking coincidence, if this estimable individual was unaware of the
pleasing picture which he presented in his benevolent attitude on the threshold, with his
opaque person coming out darkly against the back‐ground of glowing light,
He was a perfect type of the English country gentleman. There was such bland respectability teeming from his large glowing countenance, which seemed as though it were always reflecting the light of the fire after dinner, and such warmth and comfort diffused over the whole outer man, whilst his expression and general appearance gave ample evidence of the entire self‐approbation and complacency which reigned within. He welcomed Millicent with precisely the proper amount of cordiality, and folded her in an embrace systematically paternal; then releasing her, he offered his hand with that hospitable flourish peculiar to individuals in his position, and with a cheerful countenance, which seemed to say—“Behold with what self‐forgetting generosity I admit my friends to the bosom of my family!”—he conducted her towards Mrs. Egerton, who advanced from the drawing‐room to meet her.
This lady was the personification of dignified propriety, and of composed, resolute acceptance of all the advantages and privileges, physical and moral, which were to be derived from her station in society. Stately looking, well dressed, never varying one hair’s breadth from the routine of life, easy and luxurious, which is the settled system of existence for persons of her fortune and position, everything in her house, her person, her manners, and her religion, were arranged to meet the approving eye of the world.
Whether she were the urbane hostess, the careful mother, the mildly‐reproving,
silently‐determined wife, or the benevolent dispenser of soup and blankets at Christmas‐tide,
(these benefits being transmitted to her awe‐struck tenantry through the hands of a
housekeeper in black satin and pink ribbons, who wore kid gloves in case she should
accidentally touch any of the recipients of her bounty,) Mrs. Egerton still acted up to the
one principle which guided her in all things,
Millicent received another measured English embrace from this stiff but comfortable looking
representative of good feeling, dignity, and respectability, who was further remarkable for a
serenity of aspect peculiar to herself, and which emanated, no doubt, from the pleasant
conviction that every thing she had ever done, said, or thought, was exactly as it ought to
have been. She was then ushered into the drawing‐room,
Mr. Egerton presented her in due form to the various members of his family; three daughters, Anne, Fanny, and Sophia; two sons, Charles and Arthur.
Anne, tall and frigid, looking by no means so young as she could have wished; unpleasantly
handsome, having bold features and hawk’s eyes, haughty and supercilious in manner, as though
she had discovered some excellent reason why she was to consider herself superior to every one
around her, and that, duly pious and Christianized
Fanny, with indistinct hair and indefinite features, a small mind and a small voice, loving
to sing small songs and to entrap unwary individuals into swearing an eternal friendship; all
nerves and sensibility, continually declaring she must have sympathy; that she could not exist
without it; that she was entirely dependent on her friends for happiness, and therefore,
though she was sorry to be troublesome to them, yet really, constituted as she was, she must
entreat of
Sophia, decidedly plain, short, thick‐set, and able‐bodied, having a worthy look, which was
a species of moral livery to the peculiar line she had chosen; for this young lady had
discovered that her especial vocation was the improvement of mankind, and to this end she
laboured with a noisy zeal, no detail of which was ever allowed to pass unobserved by her
numerous acquaintance. She pursued her call‐
And thus she took to herself without misgiving the name of Charity;—that holy one, who with veiled face and noiseless steps glides unseen in the shadow of all who suffer;—fearing not, though snow‐white are her garments, to steal into polluted haunts; appearing, as though warned by some tender instinct, wherever tears are falling, or aching hearts are wearying to rest; through long dark nights making a pillow of her gentle arm for the throbbing head, and over many a rough and distant path, speeding with the angel words of pity or of comfort; but ever voiceless, silent, having no name, save in the prayers of the fatherless and widow.
Very charitable Sophia was pronounced to be; very estimable she was by all considered, and of late she had established herself as an authoress, by the publication of certain articles on the education of the aged ignorant, and one small volume, entitled “Hints to Bishops,” which, as Rookcliffe was a pleasant house to visit in, obtained some little circulation in the neighbouring.
The woman who writes is always in an
She has gone beyond her own province, and therefore she must consent to belie her own
nature. It would be a mockery to talk of shrinking from observation, when of her own will she
has met the rude stare of strange eyes; absurd to say that she trembles to trust her own
judgment or to guide her own faltering steps, when she who should have done the bidding of
others, has come forth to govern and influence the minds of many. She has
Sophia, however, had a fund of self‐sufficiency, which enabled her to pass through this
ordeal with great equanimity; in fact, to sum up her character in a word, she was one of those
persons who constrain free‐born Englishmen to wish most heartily that a little of the Turkish
discipline were established in their country, and that the ladies, even without yellow
slippers and the fear of sacks before their eyes, should be restricted to such spheres of
action, and such topics of conversation, as are within
Millicent’s bright visions of a loving companionship with her cousins began to melt away very rapidly after she had received Anne’s chilling welcome, accompanied by a scrutinizing look which enveloped her whole person, and subsided into a sneer, and had also been subjected to Sophia’s hard impressive shake of the hand, who already perceived in her a victim for future improvement; whilst Fanny declared that she had been put into such a flutter of spirits by the stranger’s arrival, that she required the attention of all present for some time in order to restore her to composure.
But the introductions were not yet over. Mr. Egerton next presented his two sons. Charles,
the eldest, was tall, rather good‐looking, and studiously elegant. He was refined, exclusive,
and supercilious, and, as a matter of course, always absurd, and often disagreeable. He was
one of those men who render life an intolerable burden by
Millicent saw that the frame of the young man shook, she knew not with what emotion, as his
brother spoke, but the next moment he slowly turned his head towards her, and she was startled
by seeing a countenance more entirely devoid of all beauty than any she had ever looked
upon;—a face so painfully and strikingly plain she could not have imagined, and she no longer
wondered that her cousin shrank from observation. It was not possible that his appearance
should fail to excite a feeling of
Most thankful was Millicent when the punctual Mr. Egerton, who never varied
Ah! blessed human sympathy,—gentle, loving, kindly human sympathy,—what a marvelous treasure
it is, without which, truly, we were poor indeed. It is a beautiful thing to think that to
every living soul is given the power to alleviate suffering by that one heaven‐taught
influence! too many ignore their high calling in this respect,—too many forget what a noble
power they possess, and that the weakest, the most unworthy, the poorest amongst may be, as a
minister of consolation, wearing to the eyes all dim with weeping the form of a very angel.
For even if we have only words and looks to give, we must still let the look be one of
tenderness and pity,
We are so closely knit together in this world, dust so clings to dust, that the lightest
token of a fellow creature’s dear compassion is strangely precious to us. Shame on the niggard
hearts that seek not to dispense this costly gift, and leave it withering beneath the cold,
sullen influence of their indifference or their pride! They know not what an angel they are
driving from their side when their selfish carelessness destroys the power of sympathy in
their own breasts, for it is the one only joy this earth can give which naught can ever take
away. They themselves may be most sad and lonely, the light of love and hope departed from
before their eyes, and only that quiet gloom remaining which spreads itself upon this mortal
life like some funereal pall, when the desire of earthly happiness is dead. Yet still more
blessed far is so to pity and console than to enjoy the fond affection or
Let us not mistrust our gift, however weak we feel ourselves to be; there never yet walked one on earth whose path was not darkened with the shadows of many sorrows not his own, and to these he has power to minister, were it but with the kindly pressure of his hand, or the murmured blessing, or the voice of tenderness, that soothes the troubled spirit like the soft wind breathing on the stormy ocean.
Poor little Nanette had nothing to offer for her darling’s consolation, save a few cheerful words and a bright look of affection, but it was quite enough to dispel Millicent’s passing depression, and she was soon laughing merrily at the details of her bonne’s reception in the housekeeper’s room.
She was left alone at last, and feeling that irresistible desire for a few minutes of quiet thought, which so often takes possession of us at night, she drew back the curtain from the window, and sat down to gaze out on the still, fair landscape.
No one yet ever looked up into the midnight heavens, so intensely pure, so awfully serene, where the great stars abide in changeless beauty, like the glorious hopes that float through the calm soul of a saint, without feeling the rising up within them of a strange desire,—a terror, an uneasiness,—which they can neither explain nor define; no one, at least, who is yet chained by a single thought, or hope, or wish to this world, and the things of it. Some there have been, and are, who have so learned to fling aside the clogging weight of earth’s affections, that already their enfranchised spirit hath sought and found a home within those fields of light so far off and so peaceful.
Not so with Millicent, however; she was
It is this void and craving of the mind which causes men so to labour and to toil for the realization of their various hopes and visions; for they are ever seeking madly to hew out from the dust and clay around them an aliment for that vast spiritual hunger and desire.
Millicent had always felt most strongly the longing for that unknown good which she believed
was to be found in life, else she knew not why the life had been given to her, and to‐night it
seemed to come upon her with an overwhelming power; for she had, she scarce knew why, been
disap‐
This conviction now re‐
There was the foreshadowing of a great truth in this belief of Millicent Grey’s; it was the stirring within her of the instinctive knowledge that her soul could not subsist alone,—that, except in union with a Being not her own, even that immortal essence would expire and fade away. She struggling with the inborn necessity of adoration and worship which filled her spirit, and she prepared to seek an object for it in some form of human dust, flail and erring as herself.
She believed that her rest was only to be found in daily, hourly toil for the peace of some
other,—that, in the entire devotion of her soul to the chosen friend of earth
So Millicent Grey lay down that night with a bright dream in her mind of some such loving protection and repose of self‐devotion; but she little thought how, by thus concentrating her whole faith and hope upon it, she was, in fact, preparing to stake her life at a single venture.
“MY dear Millicent,” said Mrs. Egerton, the next morning, as she sailed into the
room with an air of consequential satisfaction, as though she were aware that an invisible
herald had preceded her in the minds of all present, announcing to them the exalted position
she ought to hold in their esteem, “you will have little difficulty in becoming acquainted
with our mode of life, for when you have passed one day with us, you will know our habitual
routine of existence as completely as
“Do you mean that every day in the year is exactly the same in this house: is there never a variety of any kind whatever?” exclaimed Millicent, in some alarm.
“Not any, I think, in the external arrangements, or what I would call the outward machinery of our existence,” said Mrs. Egerton, pompously; “each hour seems to have its natural and fitting occupation, from which we seldom vary. Of course life is chequered at all times, and with us, as with others, there are occasional circumstances which create change, though without materially altering the ordinary course to which I alluded just now. For instance, an event will occur in our family next autumn, which will cause us all a very pleasing excitement.”
Next autumn! no events until next autumn. This was dreary news to Millicent. Mrs. Egerton
waited to be asked what this occurrence was, before she spoke;
Millicent was not slow to gratify her; she was much interested in hearing what was her first prospect of excitement.
“It is the arrival of my fourth daughter, Juliet, from the Continent,” said Mrs. Egerton.
“I did not know you had another daughter,” said Millicent; “I thought I had seen all the family.”
“All but this one, who is the youngest, and who has been passing some months in Italy with a friend. Until you have seen her, Millicent, you cannot understand how much reason, as a mother, I have to be proud. All my daughters are greatly above par; I am quite aware of that, but Juliet is something indeed remarkable, and totally unlike her sisters.”
“Is she, then, very handsome?” asked Millicent.
“You innocent cousin!” said Charles, laughing heartily, “how very plainly you have told us what you think of those you have already seen.”
Millicent felt she had done so, and coloured with annoyance at her own imprudent speech. Mrs. Egerton was content, however, with the implied compliment to her favourite daughter, and continued at once:—
“Handsome is not the word I should apply to her; she is much beyond that—she is strikingly beautiful. Charles, I appeal to you, if this is not the case, and you may rely on his opinion, Millicent, as he is peculiarly fastidious on the subject of beauty.”
“There can be no question that Juliet is singularly beautiful,” said Charles; “she is a
remarkable person in every way: excessively clever, with an indomitable will, and the most
consummate selfishness,—the whole concealed under a winning fascination of manner which I
really believe has never
Charles piqued himself on his talent for analyzing and describing character in a graphic and
energetic manner; he liked to treat individuals as a species of complex machinery which he was
skilled in explaining, and he was rather pleased than otherwise when he had an opportunity of
commenting on his nearest relations with the same supreme indifference which he was accustomed
to manifest to the whole race of man. He merely slightly elevated his eyebrows in reply to his
mother’s vehement protestation against the extraordinary manner in which he had thought fit to
She marveled at the pertinacity with which Mr. Egerton kept them all waiting for their letters, whilst he carefully examined the address of each one, and at the vivacity with which he literally threw himself upon the ball and rung it, as soon as the clock began to strike the hour appointed for the family prayers.
“Pray wait a moment before you ring,” exclaimed Fanny, already too late with her request; “Arthur is just coming across the lawn; he will be here immediately.”
“I never wait for any one,” replied Mr. Egerton, shouldering a huge commentary (with which he daily confused the intellects of his servants,) and taking his accustomed seat. It afforded him the most exquisite pleasure to make this speech, for he shared in common with many estimable individuals a peculiarity of temper, which rendered it intensely pleasant to him to make little disagreeable speeches, which were often very cutting and humiliating to those whom he addressed, and which he flung at them from the high ground of his own superiority as the advocate of duty and propriety.
Punctuality was one of those virtues by which he succeeded in sinning comfortably every day, inasmuch as by his excessive punctiliousness on that head he caused the greatest discomfort and annoyance to his family.
Millicent walked to the window when prayers were over; and as it opened down to the ground,
she went out a few steps to breathe the sweet morning air. She found
She went up to him with a kind smile and a winning cordiality to which he seemed little accustomed, for a flush of delight passed over his pale face.
“You have been taking a long walk, I think,” she said. “I quite envy you, it must have been so pleasant in these sunny, green fields, this morning.”
“It was indeed,” said Arthur, earnestly; “such an hour as I have passed might almost give
one courage for the bitterness which the long dull day brings with it, at least to me,” he
went on, seeming to speak to himself, and not to her. “I have been deep in the woods, where
there was not a
Milicent looked at him in astonishment; such bitterness of feeling was quite inexplicable to her, for whom the existence of suffering was a mere matter of faith; but Arthur continued like one thinking aloud, and well nigh unconscious of her presence:—
“I could not help thinking, as I walked through those green paths this morning, what a
glorious world this would be if only the human mind were in analogy to that sweet nature; were
it pure, and in hope serene as those unclouded skies, bright with the light of truth as that
calm sunshine; giving forth its fragrance in thoughts and words, gentle
He paused, and Millicent stood silent, fixing her large wondering eyes on the speaker; but suddenly she was roused by the voice of Charles, who had approached unnoticed.
“Miss Grey, I see you are mute in astonishment, from which I infer that Arthur has been
imparting to you some of his peculiar theories; I therefore consider it my duty, for your
future peace of mind in all intercourse with him,
Charles was an adept in the sneering coldness and contempt with which, in these
“A poet! Oh, I am so glad! Are you indeed a poet?”
“I am so unfortunate,” he replied, in a low voice.
“Unfortunate! That is not the word to use. How can you so mistake your calling? Oh, it is a
glorious thing to be a poet, I know nothing of the world;
“Miss Grey, you are rash, very rash,” said Charles; “you little know how extremely dangerous the writing species are, or how slight an imprudence will place you in their power. I can see already, with prophetic foresight, the daily arrival of Arthur, with a long roll of MS. under his arm, to which he will hold you bound to listen, after this incautious speech. I remember once to have mentioned that I took some interest in scientific experiments before the author of a treatise on chemistry, and the consequences were awful.”
Arthur turned hastily away as his brother spoke, but Millicent, whose gentle
“Do not go,” she said, “your brother does not at all understand what an intense charm there is for me in beautiful poetry. In fact, how can it be otherwise with any one! I am sure you do not yourself feel as you would have us think,” she continued, turning with a bright smile to Charles; “not to appreciate poetry is to undervalue one of the sweetest things this world has to offer us,—it is the very music of the mind.”
“My poor cousin,” said Charles, compassionately; “what a very uncomfortable life you are
preparing for yourself, if you continue at this unhealthy state of feeling. Let me exhort you
to reflect that an inordinate interest in any thing or person, is wholly incompatible with
that calm equanimity with which we can alone, at all times, attend to our own peace of mind,
and constantly promote that condition of placid enjoyment which is quite attainable
“You are not a believer in your own creed,” said Millicent, laughing; “or if you are, you must feel exactly like a fish.”
“Like a fish!” exclaimed Charles, startled out of his elegant repose of manner.
“Yes,” said Millicent, “the analogy may not have occurred to you, but it strikes me
forcibly, that peculiarly temperate state of mind to which you think it advisable to reduce
yourself is extremely similar to the remarkable coolness of the atmosphere which pervades the
whole existence of a fish. You will admit that they are essentially cool, externally and
internally. I think we might even define the exact species which such a character as you have
described would most resemble. I
During this speech, which Millicent delivered with much gravity, Charles turned slowly round, aunt fixed his eyes full upon her. He met in return only a glance of quiet merriment, and an involuntary smile passed over his own face.
“Talking of fish,” he said, “I think I shall go to breakfast.”
“And now,” said Millicent to Arthur, when they were left alone, “you will not say again it is unfortunate to be a poet.”
“And is it no misfortune,” exclaimed Arthur energetically, “to feel within you the stirring
of a high and lofty gift, and to know of no channel or outlet whereby you may make it
available for aught that is worth the seeking! Is it nothing to know
Millicent had no time to answer, for Sophia appeared at the window with a request that Arthur would no longer detain his cousin from breakfast, which desire she expressed to him with all the harshness and ungentleness which is so common an accompaniment of that peculiar species of worth,—most especially understood and appreciated by the possessor thereof.
Arthur moved quickly on at the sound of her voice, but as he passed Millicent she showed him a flower, which she had just gathered, laden with the bright tears of the morning.
“Look,” she said, “how heavy it is with these refreshing drops; so plentifully, while I live, the dew you spoke of shall fall upon your soul.” He thanked her with a look of gratitude, and they returned into the dining‐room together.
Now, both Millicent and Arthur were right; the one when she said it was a noble thing to be a poet, and the other that it was a great misfortune, for one or the other it will be to all who receive that perilous distinction at their birth,—either a most glorious gift, or a most fearful curse.
It has not always been a noble thing to be a poet; it has been a most debasing, a most
despicable thing, when the rare talent and the winning power have been given as ministers to
falsity and vice,—when they have ignored their high calling, their most glorious vocation, and
for the exaltation of sophistry or scepticism, have used that harp of angels, which was placed
in their hands, that with it they might echo in men’s ears the songs angelic, and lure their
souls with
And again, it is in one sense a bitter misfortune to be a poet, for Arthur spoke truly when he said that others of temperament less highly wrought, can never understand the acuteness of their feelings, the intensity of their affections; so that it ever seems to them as though they fell among rocks and stones when they seek to make themselves a rest in the friendships or the love of earth. They are cast in a finer mould than most men, and therefore is the world too rough and hard for them; their imagination is too ardent, their tenderness too deep, their susceptibility too keen; the evils that are trifles light as air to others, wound them to the very soul; and because their subtle shades of feeling and of suffering can never be conceived or shared, their existence is a continual solitude.
But from this misfortune, for doubtless in
Millicent was so deeply impressed with her aunt’s remarks as to the extreme regularity of
life at Rookcliffe, that she devoted herself to the task of watching the proceedings of the
family on this day with much energy and zeal. In fact, Fanny declared it made her perfectly
nervous to have those great brown eyes fixed on her at every moment, and to see them wandering
from one to another with a glance of such animated scrutiny. Her abrupt remarks were
It was not long before Millicent’s attention was forcibly attracted by the entire devotion of Mrs. Egerton and her daughters to the manufacture of worsted work, during the whole of that period of the day when they were not out of doors. They were somewhat confused by her earnest entreaties that they would tell her for what purpose, they were preparing those uncouth representations of bandits, with eyes of floss silk and all those flowers of unnatural dimensions and impossible hues. She seemed to think that since they plainly devoted the greater part of their existence to this delectable employment, they must surely have some hidden end; in view which would render it quite worth while, that they should have been born, educated, and carefully kept alive, by regular supplies of food, for this purpose only.
When their answers failed to give her
The gentlemen had disappeared altogether, but they met again at luncheon, and Millicent by a
few well‐timed remarks succeeded in eliciting the nature of their employments in the interval.
Mr. Egerton had been reading the newspapers, Charles had been seeing his horses fed, and
Arthur had been wandering in the woods. At the usual stated hour the carriage came round to
take the ladies for their drive; for as Mrs. Egerton informed Millicent, after luncheon, the
remainder of the day was always devoted to relaxation. What they were to relax from, her niece
could not imagine, nor
Millicent looked much astonished when Anne told her, as they passed through the hall, that the dinner hour was seven o’clock.
“Do you dine twice every day,” she said, with much simplicity.
“What do you mean?” said Anne; “did you think we dined at luncheon time?”
“Why we certainly had enough to eat to serve us for the whole day,” replied Millicent. Anne
only answered by shrugging her shoulders contemptuously. It is one of the singular facts of
the present state of society, that the qualities which in theory we hold to be most lovely and
desirable
Millicent sat next Charles Egerton at dinner, and she was at first somewhat silent, not
having been long enough in England to know what a very important and prominent place in
society has been assumed by young ladies,—and how impossible it would seem, by their own
showing, that the affairs of the Church, or the nation, should be conducted without their able
interference. She might have been somewhat enlightened
“Pray tell us, Miss Grey, what peculiarity in our manners and customs is now attracting your attention. You should remember that you have especial advantages for working at least a theoretic reform in our social system, since all is entirely new to you, which is a second nature to us, and consequently you are capable of analyzing many of those anomalies which we should never observe.”
“Indeed,” said Millicent, laughing, “it would be an immense relief to me if I might talk
openly of all I see, if I might
“Very like a savage,” said Charles, glancing at her sweet young face.
“But indeed, Millicent,” said Mr. Egerton, benignly, “I hope you will make your comments on all you see. I like to hear your fresh, unsophisticated remarks.”
Poor Mr. Egerton! he little knew all he was to suffer hereafter from the excessive bewilderment caused by these same untutored reflections which he thus encouraged in his niece. Millicent, however, had an instinctive deference for her elders, and she preferred addressing herself to Charles.
“Well, I must tell you that I am particularly astonished at all this machinery, merely for the sake of eating.”
“What machinery?” asked Charles.
“Why the whole affair; the whole ela‐
“Do you mean the servants?” he said.
“Yes, the servants; but they have souls, and intellects, and capacities, you know. Now, it is clear to me that their lives are devoted, as well as all their mental faculties, to the task of helping us to eat according to an elegant system. Just think what previous calculation and forethought they must have given to that symmetrical display of forks and spoons on the sideboard there. Who can tell what important discoveries in science they might not have gained for their fellow‐creatures with the same exercise of their mind otherwise directed?”
“It is rather a new view of the case,” said Charles.
“Then you know, it is not their time and life only, but ours also, that seems
“What an extraordinary calculation,” said Charles.
“True, nevertheless, you see. I am very
Mr. Egerton looked bewildered, and Charles laughed; he glanced at his father, and then said:
“But you forget that you would deprive us of one of the greatest pleasures we have, if you denied us our comfortable repasts. Just fancy my father’s feelings, dining upon a bunch of cherries under a tree instead of sitting down to five courses and a dessert; you must remember that to enjoy is to live.”
“Oh, now you
“Reduced what?” asked Charles.
“The business of life! What, do you mean to say that this noble creation of man, this wonderful existence given to him, this fine intellect, this vast capacity, this power of thought—that all this is intended for no other purpose than that he, as an isolated being, should experience a personal and solitary enjoyment in the gratification of his appetite,—the very lowest and meanest qualification of his nature?”
“My dear Miss Grey, pray be cautious; you really alarm me. My nerves are scarcely equal to
such startling denunciations. I
“Simply because, if you would test the real nature of a principle, you must carry it on to the extremest verge to which it could ever reach, you must judge of it in all its bearings, and work it out to the very uttermost. I think we are very apt to hold principles in themselves intrinsically evil, but which, up to a certain point, seem to be innocuous, and because we are too well bred, or too indifferent, to go beyond that limit we never consider what is their true tendency, and so freely indulge them. You distinctly said that we were to spend half our short lives in eating, because it is a pleasant occupation, and I only put that sentiment into other words.”
“Sophia, my dear, how do you feel?” exclaimed Charles, evidently anxious to escape giving an
answer; “‘Othello’s occupation’ seems to me to be gone into other
“Millicent’s ideas seem to me to be remarkably confused,” said Sophia sharply.
“Indeed they are,” said Millicent, very humbly; “I become more and more confused with every thing I see and hear.”
“But you have sufficiently proved to what miserable things our lives are given,” said Arthur, who sat on the other side of her; “will you not now say to what they should be devoted? how should the time we might redeem from the corrupt usages of society be occupied by us all?”
“Ah, that is the very difficulty which weighs upon me like the heaviest burden,” said
Millicent, her eyes filling with tears from the intensity of her feelings; “I can see the
She paused, quite ashamed of her own vehemence, and no one seemed inclined to answer. After an awkward silence of a few minutes, Mrs. Egerton rose to go to the drawing‐room, muttering to Anne, as Millicent passed her,—
“That girl’s extraordinary education has rendered her totally unfit for reasonable society, or for ordinary life.”
“You will have some trouble with her, I can tell you,” was Anne’s reply; “I should not be surprised if she brought discredit on the family by some unheard of proceedings. She has no idea of the commonest rules of society.”
Millicent meanwhile went to sit down musingly, pondering within herself, as usual, how she
could best reduce to practice the
Millicent Grey knew nothing of all this, nor would she have been equal to it; for in
SEVERAL days had passed away, and Millicent, who was thoroughly grateful for the
real kindness with which she was treated by the Egerton family, was now quite at home amongst
them, and as gay as ever. It is true, they did not seem to her to take any very animated or
very profound view of existence, but they never interfered either with her ideas or her
actions, and left her quite free to choose her own mode of life. She also found no small
pleasure in the society of Arthur,
He was as much bewildered as she was by the false lights and strange shadows that surround us in the world, and on which alone his eyes were fixed; but it was at least a mutual satisfaction to them both, to speculate together on all the deep questions which they most vainly sought to penetrate with their unassisted intellect. Truly for poor Arthur, misunderstood and little cared for in his own family, it was as though the whole earth had become full of sunshine and brightness when, day after day, he met the sweet smile of his gentle‐hearted cousin, and knew that he should hear her kind words of sympathy.
“I find we have a new neighbour,” said Mr. Egerton, walking into the drawing room, where the
whole party were assembled one morning. “I have just received a letter from a friend,
introducing to me
“Oh, do tell us all about him,” exclaimed Fanny, the only one of the family sufficiently natural to give vent to the curiosity which all felt alike.
“Lord —— tells me,” replied Mr. Egerton, “that he is an intimate friend of his, a man of excellent family and large fortune. His name is Bentley—Colonel Bentley—he acquired no small reputation in his profession; but, poor fellow, he is quite disabled now. I have a note from him, saying that he is too great an invalid ever to leave home, but that he begs me to call upon him.”
“He is a married man, probably?” suggested Mrs. Egerton, carelessly.
“On the contrary, he never had a wife. I believe his nephew is his heir, and he will have a very handsome income.”
“Is he an old man?” asked Anne.
“Why, not exactly what I should call old; about my standing, I should say.”
“Oh!” Anne made no other answer than this significant monosyllable.
“He is, then, old enough to come into the list of those whose age entitles them to the benefit to be derived from my ‘Tracts for the Elderly,’” said Sophia, her calm, measured voice; “I am glad of it.”
“My dear Sophia,” said Charles, “you don’t suppose the man to be without education; I thought your essays were for the ignorant.”
“You are right as to my intention in the publication,” replied Sophia, “but I can assure you that nowhere have I found such ignorance of the peculiar principles I wish to inculcate, as amongst those whose station in life would have led one to hope better things.” She turned her eyes, as she spoke, full upon her father; Mr. Egerton, however, endured the glance without wincing, being hardened into indifference to the schooling most plentifully bestowed upon him by his youngest daughter.
“How I should like to see this old gentleman,” exclaimed Millicent; “he would be something new!”
“Well, my dear, I know of no reason why you should not be gratified,” said Mr. Egerton. “Colonel Bentley is accompanied by his widowed sister, Mrs. Hartley, on whom Mrs. Egerton must call to‐day, and you had better go with us.”
Millicent agreed, although she had hitherto always eschewed the daily funereal drive in the family hearse, when it seemed to her that they ever went with much pomp, to bury their superfluous time. She met Arthur’s glance of disappointment, who appeared to think there would be a sunbeam less in the woods if she did not go with him to wander through them, as was their wont nearly every day, and she murmured, as she past him, a few of those gentle, kindly words that come like sweet music into the life of those to whom is given that intensity of tenderness, which is a gift so beautiful and yet so perilous.
A short drive brought Millicent, with her uncle and aunt, to Milton Lodge. Mrs. Hartley was alone in the drawing‐room when they went in. She was a very old widow lady, most simple in manner and appearance, but with a face which to look on was to love. The mild blue eyes, full of that calm look of sorrow which the many tears of widowhood alone can give, and the sweet expression lingering round the placid mouth, all spoke so eloquently of the truthful simplicity and perfect unselfishness of her character. Very childlike was her gentle spirit, for to her no gift of intellect or power of mind was given, but the far richer portion, of humility and willing submission, and a heart that ever beat with warmest sympathy towards her fellow‐creatures. The deep, unchanging grief which, with the passing of her husband’s spirit, had entered into hers, had been, during the long years of solitude that followed, as a blessed angel sitting by her side, and talking to her ever with words of wisdom and love.
She welcomed her new acquaintance with much cordiality, but Millicent was at a loss to account for the peculiar smile which passed over her face as she took the young girl’s hands; her astonishment soon ceased, however,—there was a sound of some one coming along the passage on crutches, and Colonel Bentley entered, followed by a very tall servant. Mr. and Mrs. Egerton met him with all due formality, but their amazement was great when Millicent, bounding from her seat, flew towards him, and expressed the utmost delight at seeing him again.
“I told you we should meet in England,” said he; “why you fairly bewitched me, Miss Grey! I
think you will admit I have lost no time in establishing myself as near to you as I could.” He
then detailed to her uncle and aunt the acquaintance they had made on board of the French
steamer, and further declared positively, that he had come to settle in this neighbourhood for
the sole purpose of being near her. He said he
“I had no tie, however, to any particular locality,” he continued, “and after having met with this,—excuse me, I must speak plainly,—this charming little witch here, it seemed to me that life would be so greatly improved by the addition of her society, that I determined on making my new abode as near to her as I could.”
Colonel Bentley stumbled a good deal over the latter part of this speech, as if he were
quite aware that he was not telling
“Now, Mrs. Egerton, since I have been very frank in avowing the attraction which has brought me here, I hope you will kindly allow me as much of your niece’s society as she will consent to bestow on an infirm old man.”
“And an old lady scarce less infirm,” added Mrs. Hartley, with a smile. “I am afraid your invitation is not very tempting, brother, to such a spring flower as this.”
“Perhaps not, but I am very selfish; I should like to see this bright face every day, if I could.”
“And so you shall,” exclaimed Millicent warmly; “I know I may come.” She looked appealingly
to her aunt, who graciously signified her assent. “I will come whenever you will let me, it
will make me so happy.” She pressed Mrs. Hartley’s hand involuntarily as she spoke, for the
gentle old lady, with her simple quiet words, had greatly prepossessed her. Colonel Bentley,
however, was not yet content; telling Mrs. Egerton he had still a request to make, he begged
her to allow Millicent to remain with him now, whilst they proceeded to pay some other visits
they had in view, and they could return for her on their way home. To this they also agreed,
and Millicent soon found herself, greatly to her delight, alone with her kind old friend, whom
she seemed to have known for years. He was in the greatest glee, and looked as if he could
have
They had sat talking some little time, when Colonel Bentley rose and summoned Millicent to
come with him to the library, where he said there was a treasure he wished to show her. She
followed as he led the way, and opening the door he stood back to let her pass. She paused one
moment on the threshold; one moment she stood there, turning round upon that old way‐worn man
her cloudless eyes, with their candid, confiding gaze, telling so eloquently
Thus stood she,—though she knew it not,—on the threshold of her youth’s sweet spring, from which she was about to pass for ever into that first summer of the soul, when the sunshine of earthly love shines upon it, and calls forth every latent power of thought and feeling, even as the warm, glowing beams draw out the fragrance from the flowers. She turned and entered the room, and with that one step she passed into a new era in her existence, where she never more could be, as she had been.
The first object which attracted her attention was a large oil painting, seemingly fresh
It was evidently the production of a mind of high refinement, and great purity of taste,
whilst every line bore the incontestable stamp of genius. The scene represented a wild and
frowning landscape, a very desert of savage mountains, where huge rocks rose menacing through
mist and clouds, while deep precipices and chasms were lost in a portentous darkness. In the
very midst of this abode of gloom and terror, stood one solitary female figure of the most
exquisite grace and beauty; her robes of purest white, her fair head, veiled with her waving
golden hair, her calm, and clear blue eyes, turning with a gaze
The picture was painted in the style of some of the old Italian masters, but it possessed
none of that devotional character which mostly hallows those divine works of art, many of
which were consecrated and inspired by prayer;—far other was the spirit breathing through this
splendid painting. Ethereal‐looking and lovely as was that
Millicent gazed at it long, silent, and motionless, then, drawing a long breath, she exclaimed,‐
“How wonderfully beautiful!”
Instantly there was a slight movement behind her, as of one drawing near; she turned, and her gaze fell upon that face whose image was to pass before her spirit when her eyes were closing for ever on the light of day,—and a voice, whose echo was to linger on her heart, when already with a dull faint beating it was fluttering beneath. the hand of death, came sounding on her ear.
“So sincere a tribute as yours is worth a world’s praise.”
“Why, Stephen, I did not know you
Millicent offered her hand to Aylmer with her usual frankness, and again looked up into the noble face that was bent down to her, thinking as she did so that she had never seen a countenance which bore so plainly the impress of a fine mind, and an elevated character, and wondering at the singular charm of the sweet smile that tempered so well his gravity of thought.
Stephen Aylmer had received many rare gifts wherewith to make himself a noble destiny on
earth, if so he willed it. Of these the most powerful was, perhaps, the great fascination
which he possessed over the minds of others. His personal
He believed himself very secure on the high ground he had chosen, but he knew not what
ungovernable passions lay hid in the depth of his soul, which no human will, not
Aylmer was altogether dependent on Colonel Bentley, being the only child of his sister, who had married a ruined man, and died in the same year as her husband, whilst he was quite a child. They left nothing but debts to a large amount, which Colonel Bentley paid, and adopted his nephew, designing to make him his heir. This was, however, entirely a matter of choice; he could dispose of his fortune as he would, and Stephen had no legal claim upon him. This state of utter dependence would doubtless have been very galling to the young man but for the excessive affection shown him by his uncle; their wishes were never in opposition, for Colonel Bentley so habitually indulged him in everything, that Aylmer was always ready on his part to make occasional sacrifices to his uncle’s desires.
In the present instance, Stephen had returned from the Continent to reside at
Colonel Bentley had never ceased to regret his own deficiency in this respect; as a young
man, being fond of a free and merry life, he had rather avoided any family
It was not unnatural, under these circumstances, that he should feel very anxious, since he could no longer remedy his own mistake, to prevent his nephew falling into the same, both because he really believed it essential to Aylmer’s happiness that he should marry, and also because, as he fully intended that his favourite nephew should always reside with him, he would secure in his new niece, a useful companion, whose duty it would be to perform for him all those little offices, which belong especially to a woman’s province.
Stephen Aylmer possessed much of the old chivalrous feeling respecting women, and his
bearing towards them was full of grace and gentleness, although no one could be more
essentially manly in his habits and address. Millicent felt the charm of his manner during the
conversation which en‐
They had advanced considerably in their acquaintance when Mr. and Mrs. Egerton arrived to reclaim their niece. They did not alight, and as Millicent rose to go to the carriage, she paused once again before the picture, and gazed intently on it: then she looked up with a bright smile to Aylmer, and quoted the words of the poet:
“Oh, that a desert were my dwelling‐place, With one fair spirit for my minister.”
His smile answered hers.
“You are quite right,—you have caught the idea. I have endeavoured to embody on that canvass my ideal of beauty,—of such beauty as, beaming from one human face, could make the savage desert, indeed, a dwelling place of light and joy.”
“I doubt, however, if anything so beautiful does exist in human shape.”
“I almost begin to fear it,—at least, I
“What must your ideal be, if this is not beautiful enough?” exclaimed Millicent.
“Ideals indeed!” shouted Colonel Bentley, shaking his crutch impatiently. “I have no
patience with your visionary pieces of perfection; they are all very well in theory, but I can
tell you they would be most useless, uncomfortable companions. Just fancy asking that
ethereal‐looking; individual in the white gown, whom you have painted there, to come and shake
up one’s cushion, or bring one a footstool? Take my word for it, Stephen, if your seraphic
vision were to come flying in just now, for she certainly could not walk, along with some
active, merry, sweet tempered little being, of nature’ s own making, you would soon bow your
ideal out, and tell the footman to show her the window, that she might make a poetical exit,
while you sat down to your dinner with a good honest
“I don’t think I should, indeed,” said Millicent, laughing heartily; “I am not famous for courage; but, in the meantime, I have an uncle and aunt waiting for me, who are very real and substantial, and not at all visionary; so I fear I must go.”
“Well, promise to come back every day.”
“I will, indeed, if I can,” said Millicent; and she went to the carriage, accompanied by Aylmer. Mr. and Mrs. Egerton were extremely gracious to him, and hoped to see him often; and so terminated the visit to which Millicent Grey looked back when on her death bed, as the crisis of her destiny.
MR. AYLMER called at Rookcliffe next day, and having paid a visit of considerable
length, he was about to take leave, when the horses were brought round for the Egertons and
their cousin, who were going to ride; and Mrs. Egerton proposed, as he had come on horseback,
that he should join the party. To this he willingly agreed, and they were soon on their way to
the common, through which Millicent had passed on the night of her arrival. They were all
there
Millicent Grey had never been face to face with the poor—that dark, that awful, that
mysterious portion of this world’s vast system had never passed before her eyes, that one
black page in earth’s history, which changes not from age to age, bearing ever the same record
in the single word
They would think you mocked them if you told them so. They would say that surely they had often seen the wretched beggars in the street, and that yearly they gave a large portion of their income to charitable institutions. It may be so; they know not what is poverty. Have they ever gone to pass days and nights in attendance on the sick and dying, amongst those crowds of miserable wretches who herd together in damp, black cellars, to watch there all the various shapes and stages of the agony of want?
Have they seen them seeking to forget in sleep the raging pangs of hunger,—dreaming of food, and waking to curse life, and weep for death?
Have they heard that cry, simple, familiar, daily ascending—but into which is
Have they seen parents blessing the pestilence which sweeps away the babes they have carried on their bosom? or bending over them when dying in the lingering horror of starvation, and feeling all the strong love returning, so that they would yet retain them even to their life of misery, well knowing one morsel—one little morsel—might redeem them from the jaws of death—and yet that morsel is unattainable, and they expire?
Have they seen the man with the strong life struggling in him, lying before the stores of
food, where all that could tempt the appetite is separated from him by the frail, clear
glass?—have they thought on his superhuman virtue, who stretches not out his hand to take the
means of life, when his nature was revolting against the death
They have not known poverty, they have not seen it, till they have so felt it that they turn in horror from their own luxurious boards and look in fear on the comfort of their homes—asking themselves by what right they enjoy one item of superfluity whilst at the door of their very souls a million fellow creatures stand knocking, saying, “Give us food, give us food, we perish!”
Millicent knew nothing of all this, yet she had learned theoretically that there was want and sorrow in this world, and she often wondered what it was that she felt so repugnant in Sophia Egerton’s charity.
She had a vision of Charity such as we have spoken of already, one whose feet she would have kissed, could she have met her stealing in secret through the dark haunts of wretchedness, so gentle, so humble, so loving—none knowing whither she goes, or whence she comes—braving the contagious sickness of all the noisome atmosphere, cold and heat, fatigue and long unrest, if only her presence can give comfort; enduring the rude, unholy words of evil men, the sights and sounds of blasphemy and vice, nor heeding that the delicately nurtured might shun her after, lest she suffer by the contact. Some such vision as this had Millicent; yet she was always angry at herself for not sufficiently appreciating Sophia’s exertions.
The truth was, that Millicent Grey, quick sighted as she certainly was in detecting many of
the popular fallacies and familiar little sins which, like so many respected
There is a whole system of sociable, open‐mouthed alms‐giving, which is most intensely pleasant to human nature, and especially to that nature as developed in the inhabitants of Great Britain.
Religion being essential to respectability among us, we are obliged to dress up our pleasures in a monk’s cowl and gown, before we can go out walking with them in the eyes of the world.
Now nothing looks the religious so well as that busy, excited, talkative charity, that
drives to cottage doors in a carriage filled with sympathizing friends, and holds
Millicent had not quite understood this as yet, so she looked thoughtfully after Sophia and her basket, till the voice of Aylmer at her side recalled her from her reflections.
Aylmer’s conversation was striking and full of talent: he waged war against all common
places, and when he was conversing with any one who could understand him, he invariably chose
subjects of some depth and importance, on which he could exercise the powers of his fine mind.
This was great enjoyment to Millicent, who could never be content with
Aylmer was pleased with her frank simple manner, and amused by her lively remarks. The conversation was so interesting that it was not until they had ridden several miles that Millicent remembered she had not addressed a word to Arthur, who was riding silently by her side.
There was a great change in Arthur Egerton, since the sweet face of his cousin had come
beaming in upon his dark life like
Whilst the treasure is unattainable, however, it seems mostly to suffice for the heart of man,—and it was so now with Arthur. He had never yet stilled the raging fire of his ambitious yearnings, by giving the fruit of his great gifts to the world, for he did not sufficiently love mankind either to devote his genius to benefit them, or to gain their applause for himself; but now at this time it seemed to him that he would readily employ all his rare talent to conquer one gentle heart.
He had the consciousness of his own genius, as all must have who possess it,—and at times
the wild hope came across him that the young soul of Millicent, which ever seemed to him
limpid and clear as a stream at its source, would so meet his own with its
Arthur now recalled her to a recollection of his presence, by telling her that he was
convinced her horse had cast a shoe, and that she had better stop and have it ascertained.
This was done, and his supposition was found to be correct. She was obliged to dismount while
the groom galloped off to a blacksmith’s which was fortunately near, and the rest of the party
assembled round her. Aylmer suggested that they should all take
In truth, Millicent and Aylmer had been talking too earnestly to observe the scene through which they were passing,—they were now in the very midst of the colliery district, surrounded on all sides by the miserable hovels in which the miners dwelt. It was certainly a most uninviting spot,—those cheerless, half‐ruined huts, rising but a little way above the black naked ground, had every appearance of the most squalid wretchedness; whilst the few ragged women and starved‐looking children who were crawling about, wore the stamp of abject poverty in every feature.
Aylmer was not surprised that the Miss Egertons did not choose to walk: he wished as they
did that they had stopped anywhere else. He had a horror of suffering either in him‐
“I fear they do,” said Aylmer. “It is sad to think what misery is around us, but we cannot help it.”
“We cannot help it!” She hardly understood what he meant: some impulse seemed to move her, and she walked towards the nearest hut,—Aylmer followed her. As they approached, they could distinguish a low moaning sound proceeding from within.
“Some one is in distress here,” exclaimed Millicent, and hastily pushing aside the door
which was swinging half off its hinges, she entered the cottage. She found herself in a dark
miserable room devoid of all furniture, and containing only some heaps of straw, serving
apparently as beds to the wretched inmates. Close to the hearth, where not a spark of fire
lingered among the black cinders, a woman sat crouching, her face buried in her hands, and her
continual moaning seeming to indicate that she was in pain. Two half‐naked children lay
sleeping at her feet.
“Are you ill?” said Millicent, in a gentle voice.
“Ill enough,” replied the woman, with the sort of dogged sullenness which almost invariably takes possession of the pauper, who has long ceased to hope or expect relief.
“But then you surely have a doctor to attend you?—can he do you no good?” said Millicent, who never supposed it possible that any one could have to suffer, either morally or physically, without the means of relief.
Again the woman lifted her head, and looked at her; she evidently thought that the “lady” mocked her. Millicent repeated her question; a bitter smile passed over the woman’s face,—“Oh, ay,—we’ve a doctor, sure enough,—he puts us out of pain, any how: there’s my child, in the corner, see what he has done for her.” She pointed to what Millicent had fancied was only a bundle of rags: she now saw it was a tattered counterpane, covering a little child. She went and lifted it up, but started back appalled and almost frightened; the white rigid face which met her gaze, wore that expression of sternness and of indomitable calm, which is so strangely sublime when stamped on an infant brow. The majesty of death shone forth on the innocent countenance of the pauper’s little child, and filled her soul with awe. She let the covering fall over it with silent respect, and crept back to the poor mother.
“This is very sad; I feel so much for you; poor little child! How did you lose it?”
“Do you mean, what was it killed my baby?” said the woman, not yet softened by Millicent’s gentle sympathy. “You may know that soon enough: it was starvation.”
Millicent actually screamed, “Starvation! Oh, you do not mean it. Oh how dreadful! Surely it is not possible, and to think of that loaded table yesterday! Oh, we did not know it,—we did not know it, indeed!” she exclaimed, ready almost to fall on her knees, to ask forgiveness of this woman, for the luxury in which she lived.
“Ay, like enough,” said the woman, bitterly; “what should such as you know of us poor
creatures!” And then passed through the mind of the starving pauper, a vision of that awful
history, on which the
“Oh, but if we had known it, we never would have let this happen,” said Millicent, trembling with agitation; “and at least you shall suffer no more now,—take this, take all this,” and she emptied her purse into the woman’s lap; “and I will bring you more, much more, to‐morrow,—everything you want.
For the first time the woman seemed to feel that her visitor’s compassion was genuine. She bowed her head, and burst into a passion of tears.
“Oh, my little baby, my poor, weeny baby! If I had had this, she need not have died; it is too late for her—too late!”
“But not for the others,” said Millicent, eagerly. “Oh, take comfort; I will never
“It is nothing strange, anyhow,” said the woman; “many and many’s the one I have seen worse off nor I have been. My husband’s a miner; from year’s end to year’s end he never comes out of them black mines; it’s work, work, in the dark, all day, and little pay; but it’s all one to me what he gets, I never sees a penny of it. He’s taken to drinking, that he may drive out care, and the parish won’t allow us nothing so long as he is in work—so here we may sit and starve.”
“It is a most extraordinary case,” said Millicent, “I never heard anything so sad. How strange that your condition was not known.”
The woman looked surprised; she well knew there was nothing uncommon in her case.
“Well, my lady, indeed it’s not me only; there’s scarce a family in the place that’s not as bad off nearly. I will speak up for them, poor creatures, for they have done what they could for me: many a time they’ve given me a bit of bread when not another soul’s come a‐nigh me.”
“Every family in the place as wretched!”
Millicent felt her brain almost reeling; she could not conceive the possibility of so many
human beings in want of the necessaries of life within a few miles of those who were plunged
in its luxuries; it was the horror of the contrast that overcame her. For the first time the
great problem of want and superfluity was before her; to think of Rookcliffe and Milton Lodge,
and half‐a‐dozen similar houses not five miles distant, with their abundance, their
“We cannot go home yet; I must go into those houses, and tell them we will help them. She told me they were all equally wretched—starving!”
“Nonsense, Millicent!” exclaimed Anne, “you can’t be going into those hovels just now. If the people are in want, papa will send to relieve them—but I’ve no doubt they are imposing on you.”
“At all events, you really must not go,” said Charles; “you are by no means the proper person for such a task. You don’t understand these things, my dear little cousin, or they would not astonish you so much; there must be beggars everywhere, and we cannot help them all.”
Aylmer was pained by her look of distress as her cousins spoke, and he said to her, in a low voice:
“It is really better you should not go now, but I will come here to‐morrow and do all and everything you could wish.”
Millicent thanked him warmly, and at once mounted without another word. She rode on in front with Aylmer, for Arthur seemed anxious this time not to join them, and for a few minutes both were silent; at length, she turned to him with a look of deep agitation.
“Tell me,” she said, “in one word, is it a common spectacle which I have this day seen?—is it one isolated case; or has England many such?”
“Many thousands,” replied Aylmer. “It is best, in my opinion, not to know the fearful extent of the misery we cannot relieve; but if you insist on the plain truth, I must tell it. What you have seen is indeed a sight too sadly universal, and, in fact, what we witnessed to‐day is nothing compared with the awful amount of want and wretchedness which prevail in London and the great manufacturing towns.”
She could not speak to answer him:
Heavily did the first knowledge of the great dark tragedy for ever enacted by the poor, come
over that young spirit. The sense of her own utter helplessness became insupportable: she
bowed her face on her hands and wept aloud. Aylmer felt a pang of remorse at sight of those
pure teams falling for the sorrows of others. How far gone was the time when he could so have
mourned with unselfish pity? Truly, had there ever been such a time for him? So early had the
natural sympathies, the first quick impulses been deadened by habit and education, chilled by
custom and experience; he felt that he was looking on the fresh dews that well forth only, in
the spring and morning of
Millicent was ashamed of her emotion, and she soon conquered it.
“It is the terrible, the unnatural contrast between our own condition, and that of these hapless beings, which overpowers me so much; if all suffered alike,—if such were the destiny of man, then all might submit and endure with faith and patience; but that some should have, not abundance only, but a hundred fold more than they can use, not personal luxuries alone, but the most costly ornaments to the rich homes in which they dwell, to the very floors on which they tread,—and others, meanwhile, perish, actually perish in cold and hunger; it is this that seems to me so appalling,—how can we dare to live as we do?”
“But, my dear Miss Grey,” said Aylmer, soothingly, for he saw she was strongly excited, “you
must reflect that you are now
“Doubtless,” exclaimed Millicent, “I know that equality is as impossible as it is
undesirable. I have discovered that, in reading history. I remember to have noted in the
records of nations how, when rank was abolished, the aristocracy of talent or of power
straightway took its place. No! ignorant as I feel myself, I have read enough to have imbibed
the most deep‐rooted horror for all leveling and republican principles. The distinction of
rank and station
“No doubt it is a fearful thing, and you cannot suppose you are the first to have discovered it. Believe me, the noblest intellects in our own land have been devoted to the task of seeking a remedy for it,—but they have found none as yet any more than you could; it is an evil, passing man’s power to compass.”
“But that is surely no reason why we should be indifferent to it,” said Millicent very
gently; “I think it is taking a dreary and enervating view of the case to say that because we
cannot remedy it, we will not think of it at all. I see your remark conveyed to me a strong
reproof for my presumption in attempting to discuss such a deep subject, and certainly it was
deserved,
“Unquestionably,” said Aylmer, “they are thoughts which force themselves on every mind, and I can perfectly understand, after the hermit‐life you have led, that these great evils strike you in a new and appalling light, which we who are too much accustomed to them, could not conceive. But still I can but repeat what I said before,—the deadly wound is there, but who shall find the soothing balm wherewith to heal it?”
“I am very fond of Utopia,” said Millicent, suddenly turning her bright face to him, “I like wandering there in visions which, though I well how they can never he realized, still do one’s heart good to fancy they warm one into hope. Now my Utopia for the poor, would be, that each man to whom is given as his station, the advantages of material and intellectual wealth, should instead of living for himself, live for those, his sorrowing brethren, and devote his life’s energy to ameliorate their condition,—if all did this, might not their universal efforts compass, so far as the world’s predestined fate permits, a universal evil?”
“Utopia, indeed,” said Aylmer smiling, but he had not time to add more, for Charles rode up at that moment.
“Millicent,” he said, “I can stand this no longer; ever since we had the misfortune to let
you go into that cottage you have had
Millicent saw that Charles was talking much more earnestly than was his wont, and as her spirits were far too light and elastic to remain long depressed, she readily accepted his challenge, and made the old woods ring with her clear merry laugh, as they rode homewards.
IT was quite impossible for Millicent Grey to remain long in a desponding humour,
yet she could not forget the scene she had witnessed, and when the family assembled before
dinner, she began describing it to her uncle as he stood with his capacious person
benevolently protecting the fire from any intrusive approaches.
“Well, my dear,” he answered, “this is no doubt very sad, but you would find the same
poverty in many parts of the kingdom;
Millicent had a spice of mischief in her disposition, and since her residence in England, she had often found no small amusement in reducing the respectable theories which pervade our atmosphere, to the test of practice.
“I am sure you would, dear uncle, you would do all you could for these starving people, even though it involved a little self‐sacrifice, would you not?”
“I trust, Millicent, when you have lived sometime longer in this house, you will not require
to ask such a question: you will then learn that those who feel the most, say the
“I beg that you will not suppose that you are the only person who deplores the condition of these paupers,” continued Egerton, with no small testiness; “the Egertons, from time immemorial, have laboured for the good of their tenantry.” (“And the improvement of their lands,” continued Charles, with his running accompaniment,) “And that in a manner which would prove to you that they do not shrink from self‐sacrifice.”
“Oh, I am sure of it,” said Millicent, “and in this instance also, as well as in others.”
“Certainly, if there were anything to done, but we have often talked it over our parochial meetings, and it is a case beyond our efforts.”
“Well, you are so indulgent, you know, uncle, in letting me tell out all my wild
She hesitated, and laughed at what she inwardly qualified as her own cool presumption.
“Let us have it, my dear,” said Mr. Egerton, condescendingly patting her shoulder. “Curious results have often arisen,” he continued, addressing his wife, “from the innocent remarks of children and young persons; their very ignorance causes them to take such novel views of the subject as often produce very valuable suggestions.”
“I wonder whose remarks are innocent now,” murmured Charles, as he looked at the contrast between his father’s bland and stolid countenance, where beamed not a ray of any fire more ethereal than that at which he was slowly roasting, and Millicent’s intelligent face, her clear eyes sparkling with all the rigour of a young, fresh intellect.
“Then I have leave to say anything I please, however presumptuous?” asked she.
Mr. Egerton waved his hand encouragingly.
“Pray tell me, then, supposing that two thousand pounds could be yearly distributed for the support of the miners’ families, or for increasing the pay of the men themselves, to such an amount as should prevent the possibility of want for their children, would it not go far to relieve the distress even of that whole district?”
“Of course it would, any child might know that; but where is such a sum to come from?”
Millicent cast a sly glance at the old gentleman’s pockets, which suddenly enlightened Charles as to the nature of her ideas on the subject; she took care, however, that her words should not seem quite so crude as were her thoughts.
“Why you know, uncle, you told me when you were describing many of the English customs to me, that an establishment like yours could not be kept up under three thousand a‐year, and that the rest of your income went to the improvement of your estate.”
“Very true.” Mr. Egerton began to look uneasy.
“Then, if all persons situated like yourself were to feel that they would like to make any sacrifice to save the starving people, you might all determine to give up, at least, a whole two thousand a‐year to them; and it could be easily done by changing the style of living entirely, and reducing the family expenses to somewhere about eight hundred a‐year. It would be quite riches, you know, in comparison to what half the population have.”
“Easily done!—riches!” Mr. Egerton was so astonished that he could only ejaculate a
“Yes,” we should all have to give up our comforts, of course—carriages, horses, all that; but then what could be compared to the luxury of knowing that never again should any one die of starvation so near; and we might be immensely happy and comfortable on the income you still would have left. We should live in a very different way, and being so large a family, perhaps we should not have much more than the necessaries of life; but these necessaries would be shared by hundreds of families, who have them not at all just now.”
“Shared. indeed!” said Mr. Egerton
“It might not be possible to live at Rookcliffe on that pittance,” continued Millicent,
warming with her subject, “but as it is not an old family place; and only lately bought by
yourself, you could complete the good work
“Now, thanks to my good fortune, the place is entailed,” muttered Charles.
“Millicent, you are talking the most consummate nonsense,” suddenly shouted her uncle, having recovered his voice and his breath, which had been fairly taken away by her unexpected proposal. “You don’t know what you are saying, and I wish to goodness you would keep quiet,—I never heard such arrant folly in my life.” Millicent was frightened into silence fast enough by this tremendous burst of indignation, and she retreated behind her cousins, who were all laughing heartily.
“I’ve one comfort,” said Mr. Egerton, beginning to cool down, and addressing his wife, who
was the picture of rigid disapprobation, “that mad girl’s own fortune is safe in my hands till
she is of age, and I
Mr. Aylmer dined with them next day, and Millicent found that he had amply fulfilled his promise with respect to the poor people she had seen. He had awakened Colonel Bentley’s compassion for them, who, like many other good people, was most liberal whenever his attention was drawn to the subject, but who never thought it could be at all necessary for him to rise out of his usual apathetic indifference unless an actual appeal were made to him. His nephew had, however, spent the day among the miners, and he brought Millicent such a report of the relief they were to receive, as filled her with gratitude towards him.
The party at Rookcliffe was further
Millicent found herself seated between Charles Egerton and the curate, with Aylmer
sufficiently near to join in the conversation. Charles had been talking with him, of his
extreme impatience for the arrival of the hunting season, which was in his estimation
“That is a noble sight you have yet to see, Miss Grey,” said the curate; “of course you have never witnessed an English fox‐hunt,—I quite envy you the first impression, you will be so delighted.”
“Don’t calculate on Miss Grey being delighted with anything that delights other people, my dear Reverendissimo,” said Charles. “With all due respect, Millicent, I may be allowed to mention, that your tastes and ideas are slightly peculiar. I have no doubt, if you would favour us now with your views on fox‐hunting, you would prove to us that we had been labouring under some great mistake respecting it.”
“You really make me feel,” said Millicent, laughing, “as if I had some mental
“Exactly; but that is just the thing. All our innocent customs seem to you so very black,” replied Charles. “Pray tell us now, however, what you think of hunting. Where is our error? Perhaps it is not a fox we run after at all.”
“Very true,” said Millicent, composedly, “it is not the fox, it is his tail, and that is just what surprises me,—to think of ever so many intellectual men; all very learned, having had classical educations and the highest grade of instruction, giving themselves so much trouble and expense, and putting themselves into a violent heat, all for the sake of getting the simple tail of a fox.”
“But we don’t call it a tail,” exclaimed Charles, “it is the brush.”
“You can call it what you like, but it is the tail all the same, you know, neither the fox himself nor anybody else can doubt that; and I must say, few things astonish me more than the extraordinary love you all seem to have for it. You keep up horses and hounds at an enormous expense; you have a whole establishment for the purpose, and actually a sort of uniform, as if you were going to conquer an army instead of gaining only a wretched little tail. You long for the hunting season all the year round, and then, when the happy time does come, you all assemble together, ever so many full‐grown men, in the pride of your intellect and strength, and you ride off at the risk of your lives, all struggling who is to gain the precious piece of goods, and every one hating the man who gets it, when he rides back in triumph with his tail.”
“Millicent, you are really too absurd,” said Charles. “it is not the brush, or the
“The amusement of seeing a fox die,—of watching it straining and panting, with its poor heart bursting, as they say it does sometimes, in the effort,—flying in the torture of pursuit, with the open‐mouthed dogs at its heels, making the most incredible exertions to escape, and then sinking exhausted and quivering, to feel the teeth of the hound in its throat. No, I would rather think it was the love of the tail, than believe that men of feeling and mind should make their pleasure in the death‐agonies of poor helpless animal?
“But, Millicent, you do use such extraordinary terms. It is not the actual pleasure of
seeing the fox die, though they do a great deal of mischief, and must be destroyed, but
“If the foxes must be destroyed, let the farmers destroy them, or the butchers who perform
the same office for the oxen and sheep. You never think of kindly relieving
“Miss Grey, it seems extraordinary to hear you talking, against what has always been
considered quite an honour to England
“I cannot think it manly to take a pleasure in the torture of a poor dumb victim, and that any one should find sport in it is beyond my conception. No, Charles, I am certain if you analyze the especial charm of fox‐hunting, you will find it is the intrinsic value of the tail, unless, as I said before, you choose to admit that it is the delight of seeing the unhappy brute killed before your eyes,—in which case if humanity has fallen thus far, the sooner they give up fostering so cruel a taste the better, to my mind.”
“Only you must remember, Miss Grey,” said Aylmer, “that the same argument applies to all field‐sports; shooting, and fishing, and everything of the kind.”
“Well, I can only say of these as of fox hunting, I do think it degrading to man that he
should find his pleasure and amusement, in the pain of any created thing.
“Well, Miss Millicent, I declare I have you there!” exclaimed Charles. “You do give a great pleasure to others in hunting; for the hounds like it extremely: they take a real pleasure in it.”
“Then, do you mean me to suppose that Englishmen are so very tender‐hearted, and so
considerate of the feelings of the lower animals, that they actually take all this trouble,
and devote themselves, at the risk of their lives, for the sole purpose of pleasing their
dogs? How extraordinarily kind!
“There is no use in arguing with you, most pertinacious cousin,” said Charles, “but really it is incredible that you should composedly give forth a sweeping condemnation of all field sports, the old well‐established amusements of England.”
“You must lay all the blame on my defective education,” said Millicent, laughing. “I am quite aware that I have never learned my catechism.”
“Come, that is in my province, Miss Grey,” said the curate; “I will undertake you as a pupil.”
“Oh, no, I do not mean what you would be bound to teach me,” said Millicent. “I mean that
theoretic catechism, unacknowledged but universally learned, which teaches the popular and
received meaning of those things that are not destined to be called by their right names. It
seems to me that, in this country, every one is duly instructed in a set of useful
principles—little systems for the rule of social life, which are all ticketed and labeled with
the finest possible sounding names, and these, when once impressed upon the young mind, can
never again be separated from the fallacy they protect. I dare say the children have
picture‐books full of practical illustrations, and their nurses show them two men shooting at
each other, and say, ‘Now, my dear, this is honour;’ (for you call a duel the vindication of
your honour, don’t you?) and a gentleman watching the worrying of a fox, Charles, and say,
‘This is a
Aylmer brought Millicent a most pressing request from Mrs. Hartley and her brother, that she would spend the following day with them, to which she willingly agreed; and from that time forward, it became a sort of tacit arrangement that she should be with them every day when it was possible for her to walk to Milton Lodge.
THREE months had passed away: autumn had come with its sighing winds, so like the
voice of the decaying year lamenting its departed brightness; and, outwardly, there seemed
little more of change, in the inhabitants of Rookcliffe, than in the old walls themselves.
And, yet, if we had power to see it, strange wild dramas are enacted day by day in the silent
souls of those around us; they walk beside us unchanged in aspect, and we dream not of the
dark shadows that
And the other was far away, in a chill and frozen region, where the sun of hope had sunk, as beneath the deep waters of despair, so that there was no day there, and no melody, because the voice that made sweet music gave all its gentle tones unto another, and no beauty, because the face beloved, was radiant only with the joy, that came from other love than his.
It may be, that if some observed, how the tread of Arthur Egerton, was slower and heavier than of old, and his eyes dim, as though, not sleep alone, but dreams, had fled from him, they thought the chill weather, and the gloom of decaying nature subdued the poet’s fiery soul; but they never dreamt that these were tokens of the cold dead winter of the heart, where all the sweet blossoms of his spring of hope, lay mouldering away, blasted by the freezing winds of disappointment; and little did they think, when calmly he moved amongst them, that he had passed through that convulsion of the mind, which is like to the shock of death itself, for it is the rending away of the very life hope, from the being that seems to fall a dull inert mass of clay without it.
But if they noted the change that had passed on Millicent Grey, they could, in some sense,
understand it; for they knew
She had done that thing, the most perilous, the most awful which any can do in this mere
mortal life. She had delivered up her whole heart and soul to the love of one human idol. We
have seen how her young, ardent spirit had flown forth into life, to seek that object for its
worship, which, exiled from its own true home by ignorance and misconception, it sought in
earth alone; and how she was led to the belief, that the intense indefinite longing, the
aching void of her soul could, only find a rest in one deep human affection,—in the entire
devotion of her life to the happiness of another. Before ever she had learnt to
And now, with her, that surrender of every faculty of the being, to one absorbing thought, was entire; for she had no ties of blood, no childhood’s affection to draw her heart’s deep tenderness in other channels, nor had she ever yet effected an entrance into that bright and holy life, within whose pure atmosphere no god of dust and clay can find a throne.
Once in a life‐time, only, is such an affection felt, as that which bound Millicent Grey to
Stephen Aylmer. All was bright and prosperous around her now; a few short months, as she
believed, would see her linked to him by holiest ties; yet not because of present hope and
joy, was this deep, earnest friendship so intense. If in the future, storms and clouds should
come upon the sunshine of her happiness,—if even he who was her idol, should by
And she was changed. The fierce independence of mind, the quick energetic scrutiny of life,
were over. Much more thoughtful, more still and silent; every look and tone told how her
spirit was subdued to his. She thought as he thought, loved what he loved, and could have even
learned to hate what he hated. Her eyes no longer wandered restlessly, seeking a hope in life,
but ever rested on him, in whom all joys were bound up; her feet no longer strayed, searching
a path that should give the promise of an aim on earth, but meekly journeyed where he trod,
content to make it her life’s mission, to
And Stephen Aylmer?—was she all in all to him, as he to her? No one ever made a plot so
palpably manifest, or flattered himself that he concealed it so ably, as did Colonel Bentley,
when, having set his heart on effecting a marriage between Aylmer and his favourite Millicent,
he commenced, by a series of the most glaring manœuvres, the task of accomplishing his
purpose. Colonel Bentley was a singular old man; if once an idea took possession of him,
however unexpectedly or wildly, it was utterly impossible for himself or others to eradicate
it. Already when he quitted Millicent, at the Tower Stairs, on their arrival, had he made up
his mind that she was the very person he desired to be the wife of his favourite nephew, as
well as a satisfactory niece to himself, and he never from that moment lost sight of his
object. For this reason he came to Milton
But Aylmer had no desire to disappoint his uncle’s wishes, if by any means he could
accommodate himself to them, and this, after a short acquaintance with Millicent, he found
himself willing to do. He had not the slightest attachment for her—he never yet had felt a
strong affection for any one, and she had failed to effect any change in this respect. He had,
in fact, come to the conclusion that he never was to find his ideal, or feel deeply for any
living being. But it was impossible to know Millicent Grey, so frank, so generous, so
warm‐hearted, without loving her in some degree; and he did like her, quite well enough
In short, it had not been given to her to call to life the strong affections that lay hid in
the heart of that proud man; waiting only, till the crisis of his destiny, to rise up
He could not but love her too, in some degree, now that the near approach of the time fixed
for their marriage had put an end to reserve between them, and that he saw how generously and
devotedly her whole heart was given to him. His warm sympathy for the poor, and active
exertions on
She felt that he had given her the highest proof of esteem, in choosing her from all the world, to be his first and best friend until death, and she asked no more, since this gave her a right to minister even to his faintest wish.
Moreover, her attachment had that entire disinterestedness, which is inherent to the very nature of all deep and intense affection. She no longer thought of herself at all, save as the privileged guardian of his existence on earth; nor had she now any wish, or hope, or object, except his happiness. This was the star of her life, which was to guide her every thought, and word, and deed,—it was the desire of her heart, the one absorbing thought of her soul; his happiness, not her own; nor yet his only, as united to hers, but his, by any means in which it could be procured for him, either by the offering of her whole life’s devotion with him, or the sacrifice of her whole life’s joy without him.
They stood together now, side by side, on a rising ground, within the park, at Rookcliffe,
where they had been walking. They were returning home, and paused here, to look at the fair,
peaceful scene that
It might have been the melancholy season of the year, the sight of nature in her mourning
garments, as though it were her time of widowhood for the summer,—the whisperings of decay and
death that went forth in the rustle of the falling leaves, and
“How silent you are, dear Millicent,—almost sad, I think.”
The sound of his voice made her smile.
“No, not sad, I could not be so now, I am too deeply, really happy. But to‐day, I do not know how it is,—I fear you will think me fanciful,—only I feel such a terror.”
“A terror of what?” he asked, anxiously.
“Of life, I think,” she answered; “it seems to me such a fearfully precarious thing,—its
entire happiness or utter misery hangs on so slender a thread. Often,—the living or dying of
one single hope, can make it a beautiful and blessed gift, or a crushing, intolerable burden.
Its destinies are
“Dear Millicent, these are dark words, indeed! I hardly know you, speaking thus. All you say
is perfectly true, no doubt, but it should only make us rejoice the more that
“I do not think it can be for myself I fear, though, in truth, I hardly know what it is that
terrifies me to‐night,—but cannot be any thought of myself; for, Stephen, you do not know, I
never can tell you, how all my hopes, and wishes, and feelings, have become absorbed in one
intense, unutterable longing for your happiness. It is my one dream, my one thought,—I can
seek, I can strive for nothing else. I almost fear it must be wrong, to be so given up to this
one
He was touched by these words, the tone of her voice told how they came from her very heart. He spoke to her with a grateful tenderness, and soon soothed the passing agitation into which she had allowed herself to be betrayed; then, anxious to divert her thoughts from the dark misgivings which seemed unaccountably to have taken possession of her, he continued, with greater cheerfulness,—
“Now I shall not let you think any more of these dismal forebodings. Tell me rather what is that black shadow passing along the avenue down there? It looks, at this distance, like a great spider creeping on towards the house.”
“It is the carriage, I have no doubt, coming home with my cousin Juliet. You know she is to arrive to‐day from Italy, and this is just the hour when she was expected.”
“True,—I remember! I am rather anxious to see this same cousin of yours; I heard of her often at Milan, but never chanced to meet her. You have never seen her yourself, have you?”
“Oh, no; she has been absent ever since I was at Rookcliffe—but they speak of her constantly. I have heard her described many times.”
“And always as a wonderfully beautiful person, have you not? At least, that was the reputation she had in Italy, and my artist friends were by no means easy to please on that subject.”
“I suppose there were never two opinions as to Juliet’s beauty; even Charles was enthusiastic about her. She must be a strange person, from his account; he described her to me, as having a very subtle, powerful mind, hid beneath a great outward appearance of frankness.”
“Well, excuse me if I seem rather un‐
“I hope you mean that as a compliment, for I shall certainly appropriate it,” said Millicent, laughing. “But I trust you are right about Juliet, for I feel rather afraid of her, after all I have heard.”
“On the contrary, you must try to make a friend of her. It annoys me to see you meeting with so little sympathy among those Egertons—Anne freezing you, Sophia lecturing, and Fanny worrying. I hope Juliet will be more companionable.”
“I doubt it; but we must go and see her now, for I have a vision of my uncle
“As I always do at your extraordinary system of analysis. However, let us hurry home, by all means, and prevent the deterioration of Mr. Egerton’s moral nature.”
They met Fanny in the hall at Rookcliffe, where Aylmer was at present staying.
“Juliet is arrived!” she exclaimed; “she has been asking for you, Millicent, but now you must wait till she comes down to dinner, for she has gone to dress.”
Millicent went to her room, and the indescribable gloom which had for the time been
dispelled by Aylmer’s gay conversation, returned upon her with redoubled force. When she rose
to go to the drawing room she paused a moment ere she passed the large mirror which reflected
her figure; her cheek was pale, and her countenance devoid, for the time, of the bright,
lively expression which formed its great charm. She still wore mourning for her father, and
the peculiar truthfulness of her character made her at all times dress with a severe
simplicity, which, just as she intended, did not enhance her beauty. She could not endure to
use any art or forethought
“Aylmer would surely have wished for a fairer bride!”
She did not know how much, at that very moment, was lovely in her face as its expression
shadowed forth the feelings of her generous heart, nor even how pleasing in the sight of all
were those large brown eyes and the soft hair, almost of the same colour, shading the pale,
quiet brow. Yet, certainly, there was a strange contrast between herself and the radiant
figure that met her gaze as she entered the drawing‐room. She started back almost terrified at
the sight which presented itself—either she was dreaming, or there was before her the exact
counterpart, the living embodiment of the pictured figure in which Aylmer had represented his
ideal—the countenance was not the same, but the dress, the attitude,
A terrible snare to Juliet Egerton had been her great loveliness. She had delivered herself
up to the evil influence, it has the power to exercise without a struggle. The one sole object
of her life, was to gain all the fair gifts of this world which beauty had the power to
procure for her,—universal admiration—the praise of men—the love of many hearts. Self was with
her all in all. So soon as an idea, a wish, a feeling rose in her mind, it must straightway be
gratified at any cost; the consequences to others were never to be thought of, and her great
natural talent, her subtle, intriguing mind ably assisted
Her present return to Rookcliffe was, she well knew, most opportune for the execution of a design, which had for some time been powerfully agitating her mind, and which, in a singular manner, affected the interests of those now present with her.
It was only for a few brief instants that Millicent Grey looked upon her in silence, but in that space she had time to observe that the meaning look, in the splendid eyes of Juliet Egerton, which so remarkably imitated the expression in the fair face of Aylmer’s ideal, was turned upon her own future husband, whilst his gaze was riveted upon her cousin’s countenance in evident admiration.
Quickly, however, the picture full of life and interest which they presented thus grouped, dissolved away at the sound of Mr. Egerton’s voice.
“Come, Millicent, and make acquaintance
“
Juliet instantly passed from her striking attitude to another no less graceful, with arms
outstretched to embrace her new relation. She glided towards her;—in the softest and sweetest
of tones expressed her delight at meeting her, and when the first few sentences had passed
between them, wound her arm round her neck, and drew her gently back to the spot where Aylmer
stood. Millicent could not account for it, but she felt that she infinitely preferred the
Siberian shake of Anne’s elegant fingers, or the stern grasp of Sophia’s hand, to the warm
embrace of Juliet. She answered gently and kindly to her enthusiastic expressions of pleasure,
and then slipping from the soft twining arms, took refuge at Aylmer’s side. He scarcely heeded
her, so intent was his gaze on Juliet,
“Is it not extraordinary how she resembles the picture of your ideal?” said Millicent to Aylmer, “and yet you never saw her?”
“The likeness has struck you also, then,” exclaimed Aylmer, quickly; “it is indeed most remarkable. What a strange coincidence!”
“Perhaps no coincidence,” said the soft musical voice. They could hardly tell who spoke, for Juliet had not turned her head, yet the tones were hers, and her hearing must have been singularly acute to have caught the words of their whispered remark. Aylmer looked bewildered, and Millicent felt a strange terror, as though she had suddenly been brought in contact with one of those dangerous magicians of whom we read in the German tales, who are so wonderfully beautiful, and so full of subtle wickedness.
Aylmer had no time to ask an explanation, for they now went to dinner. Juliet sat opposite to him, and engaged his whole attention, as in truth that of all others. She monopolized the conversation, and spoke well and brilliantly. She talked only of Italy and the fine arts,—of music, but chiefly of painting, and that with a wild enthusiasm which lit up her charming face with redoubled beauty, and kindled the very souls of her hearers.
“You talk so like an artist, Juliet,” said Charles, “that I begin to be suspicious of the
contents of some large boxes I saw among your packages. Pray, do they contain your own
performances as a
“Yes, my own despair that is embodied on canvas,” she answered, with her gay ringing laugh,
“for it is nothing less than despair, to find how impossible it is to give a material
existence, to the fair visions of one’s dreams.
The great peculiarity of her beauty was the singular contrast of those eyes, so dark as to be almost black, with her golden‐coloured hair. She well knew their power when, as now, she fixed them with their intense gaze on the face of Aylmer.
“Indeed you are mistaken. I know the feeling of which you speak right well. The pictures of my dreams, are not more like the reality, than the glowing landscapes we sometimes fancy we see, among the sunset’s radiant clouds, are like the earthly scenes of rock and stone. I suppose no painter ever was or could be satisfied with the outward expression of those beautiful shapes, that pass before his spirit, any more than the poet is content with the words into which he seeks to infuse the fire of his heart, or the composer, with the notes in which he would breathe out his soul’s harmony.”
“Doubtless, but were it not so, there would be no arriving at perfection,” said Juliet.
“It is the struggling of the soul to beam through the thick veil of this mortal body,” said Millicent: she spoke so low that Arthur only heard her.
“You must tell me how you knew that I was an artist?” said Aylmer to Juliet. She made no answer, but the large eyes still gazed on him with a look too strange and intense, to seem bold,—he preferred that look to an answer,—it was plain that some mystery existed in her mind respecting him, which awoke his interest and curiosity, to the uttermost.
“At least you will let me see your own pictures. I feel sure they are striking.”
“To‐morrow,” she said, and resumed a more general conversation.
She seemed bent on making a conquest of Millicent, and addressed her continually, but
chiefly on subjects with which it was
In the evening he sought especially, to find an opportunity of asking Juliet an explanation,
of her mysterious resemblance to his picture, but this she seemed determined he should not
have. Once only she was alone when he came near her, and then starting up, she went to the
piano with a smile which invited him to follow. She sat for a few moments, passing her hands
dreamily over the keys, as though gradually losing con‐
Millicent sat, meanwhile, in a large armchair near the fire; she crouched down in it as
though she would have hid herself, and sought a shelter. Arthur was placed behind her; his
head rested against the chair on which she reclined; neither spoke, and so passed the evening.
They were to separate at last for the night. Mr. Egerton systematically marshalled his troop,
and presented each individual with their candlestick, as though he were arming them, for some
important
It was strange that Millicent had not felt the faintest pang of jealousy towards Juliet. Her
perfect guilelessness, and the trusting simplicity of her character, seemed to save her from
the most miserable peculiarity of the woman’s nature. She judged Aylmer by herself,—true and
unchangng as human heart, may be, was hers, in its deep love for him, and so she believed of
him. He was her promised husband: surely nothing could ever make him other than her own. It
was
She stood lifting up those trusting tender eyes to his thoughtful face, but not till she extended her hand, and whispered her earnest “Good night,” did he notice her presence. Then, as he looked down and met that sweet smile, that loving gaze, one less guileless than she was might have trembled to see how the blood rushed to his forehead, under the remorseful sting of recollection,—he clasped her hand in his, and his “Good night, dearest Millicent,” was so warm and energetic, that it brought tears into those gentle eyes. She went to rest, with a lightened heart.
There was another who went to his room that night, with the crushing weight that
There are some characters full of an inherent power and energy, which is of depth
inconceivable,—who are filled with a terrible capacity for good or evil, which is never called
into life until some ungovernable affection, fearful in its strength, becomes to the man a
very principle of existence,
This dream had been dispelled, how utterly! Not many weeks after Stephen Aylmer passed the
threshold of the old Hall at Rookcliffe, in Millicent’s first look of affection on another,
Arthur understood that she had never felt for him aught save barren pity, and straightway in
that hour the fair, sweet hope he cradled in his breast, died in the agony with which a
slaughtered man expires. So long as it lay within him a corpse, making a charnel house of his
soul, he had but one thought,—the thought that has been dreary yet sweet comfort to most of
us, at least once in a lifetime, that the
He was almost terrified at the indomitable strength he felt within him to overthrow all obstacles, to work by any means for this his heart’s desire.
Arthur Egerton had neither hope nor love out of this world, which could induce him to feel that there is but one thing to be ardently desired on earth, even the preservation of the soul’s rectitude and purity, but rather having delivered up his spirit to the adoration of one earthly good, it seemed to him a noble thing to offer in sacrifice to it, if need were, even the very dignity of his moral being, his very honour and integrity. He had an instinctive consciousness of this great truth, that no personal gratification can be obtained without departing from that fixed standard of right, in which one of the first principles, is the immolation of self for the good of others.
But nothing is more easy than to render crime poetical, Arthur’s gift of genius, hitherto
wasted, was now perverted, and cast a most false glow over his deep selfish love. It made his
heart throb with a powerful delight, to feel that not only he
THE morning light brought Juliet Egerton fairer than ever before the eyes of
Aylmer. She came bounding through the glass door of the breakfast‐room, her hands full of
flowers, radiant and bright as a type of the morning itself. She stopped, and held them up in
triumph just where the sunshine was streaming into the room, so that the golden rays flashed
on her waving hair, and lit up her brilliant eyes. Her clear voice sounded a gay good morning
to
It was not wonderful if this dazzling figure shut out from his eyes that other so gentle and
nunlike, that sat patiently admiring her beautiful cousin. And yet captivated as Aylmer
certainly was by Juliet’s remarkable loveliness, it was not her outward fascination which had
already so powerfully drawn him towards her,—it was the evident interest springing from some
mysterious source which existed in her mind for him. He could not account for it. He was
certain he had never seen her before, yet he felt that they were not strangers, he felt that
he was known to her in no common way. It was impossible but that this conviction should deeply
occupy him,—it caused him to scrutinize her every look and gesture, and each one of these
movements, as he watched her, seemed more graceful than the last, swiftly drawing
Aylmer had petitioned that he might see Juliet’s paintings; but she refused to show them till a room had been appropriated to her use as “studio,” where she might arrange them in suitable lights, and where, hereafter, she might paint undisturbed.
This was not done till late in the afternoon; and the whole morning he sat entranced with
her voice as she sang or spoke to him in her liquid Italian. Still, he was never alone with
her: she was constantly at Millicent’s side. Juliet would look from Aylmer to her at times
with an air of melancholy interest, and seemed anxious to draw her into conversation; but poor
Millicent never appeared to so much disadvantage. And had Aylmer been less
Millicent had left the room, and Juliet, who stood thoughtfully looking after her, turned to Sophia.
“It is strange, I do not think you have described Millicent in your letters at all as she is. Charles and the rest of you used to speak of her charming vivacity and cheerfulness. She seems to me possessed of none at all. She is so very—I hardly know what to call it—I should say sad, if that were not impossible, with so bright a fate as hers.”
“Out of humour will express it, I have no doubt,” said Anne, who, by some conjuring trick of a mental nature, invariably transferred her own faults to the possession of others.
“Millicent is spoilt,” said Sophia, in her usual sententious manner.
“What has spoilt her?” asked Juliet. Sophia looked with phlegmatic prudence to the corner of the room, where Aylmer sat reading, and paused in her answer.
“He does not hear—he is too distant from us,” said Fanny, eagerly. Her lively curiosity condescended to the most insignificant material for an aliment; and she was bent on hearing Sophia’s definition of the change in their cousin.
“It is the prospect of her marriage which has spoilt her; she has never been the same creature since. I suppose she is much elated by it, though how any one can be elated by the entire loss of their independence, and the subjection of their will to one of their fellow creatures, on a mere equality with themselves, passes my comprehension; but, certainly, I had trusted Millicent was beginning to profit by my instructions, and now she has eyes and ears for none but Mr. Aylmer. I presume she imagines herself perfect since he chose her.”
“She has not much to be proud of, I can tell her,” said Anne, with her habitual sneer. “If ever a man was driven into a marriage, he was. Colonel Bentley never rested till he made up the match; and I only wonder Stepheu Aylmer was so easily led.”
“Dear Anne, do be careful, he will hear you,” said Juliet, with her soft voice, by no means so low pitched as usual, and a gleam of triumph in her eyes, as she saw that she had effectcd her object, and that his sudden movement showed he had heard these remarks.
The painting‐room was arranged at last, and the whole family assembled to see Juliet’s
pictures. They were large oil paintings, chiefly copies from the old masters. Aylmer was
struck with surprise at the sight of them; although she had not in the remotest degree
attained to his own excellence in the art; they were yet
“It is plain you are but a beginner,” he said, at last, “but with energy and perseverance you may attain to a high degree of perfection.”
“I can do nothing unaided,” said Juliet. “In Italy I never could work unless my dear old
master were at my side to call out ‘
“I will be both to you,” said Aylmer, earnestly.
“Do you mean what you say? I may take you at your word? Oh, how gladly! But, for you, is it
not a rash offer? Think of the long hours when the master must guide the pupil’s powerless
hand. Is it
“
“Then the office is upon you beyond recall. Oh, how thankful I am that I shall yet be a painter!” Juliet looked up as if she had no thought but enthusiastic delight at the prospect of being assisted in her pursuit of her favourite art.
“Indeed, Mr. Aylmer, I shall be very glad if you will kindly give my daughter a few lessons in your leisure moments,” said Mr. Egerton, who had an inconceivable aversion to the class of individuals whom he was wont to term generally “Monsieurs,” and who infested his house at the period of the Miss Egertons’ education. Like most Englishmen, who have never left their own country, he was under the strong conviction that they were all rascals, and felt profoundly uneasy about the silver spoons, whenever they were asked to luncheon.
“How many leisure moments has Aylmer had of late, Millicent?” said Charles, as he stretched himself in the luxurious arm‐chair, provided for Juliet’s future accommodation. “Of course the time when he is occupied with you must be said to be devoted to business. An engaged man goes to his duty as regularly as a clerk to his desk, for so many hours a day. I have no doubt you make the work as pleasant as any could,—sweet little Millicent,—but commend me to my freedom.”
This was certainly not a pleasant speech for Aylmer, and, after the manner of most men, he
visited his annoyance on the unoffending. He glanced, half angrily, at Millicent, and turned
from her with a movement of impatience. There is a French expression, which alone can render
Millicent’s feeling at that moment “
“Well, now we shall leave Juliet in undisturbed possession of her studio,” said Mrs.
Egerton, as she rose and kissed her handsome daughter with proud satisfaction. She was truest
to the woman’s nature in her overweening indulgence of this favourite child. They all left the
room; Aylmer held the door open for the ladies to pass, for Charles and Arthur had gone out
“I suppose Mr. Aylmer is going to give his first lesson, it will be a real pleasure to so enthusiastic an artist as he is,” remarked Mrs. Egerton. “My Juliet has such extraordinary talent.”
“Millicent,” said Arthur, in a supplicating voice, which trembled in spite of himself, “will you come and walk with me a little while in the garden: it is so long, so very long, since we have been together there.”
“Dear Arthur, pray excuse me to‐day, my head aches, and, besides,”—Millicent’s tender conscience took the alarm at any equivocation,—“I think I promised,—I believe Mr. Aylmer expects me to walk with him.” She could not have left the house where he was.
“Not yet,” murmured Arthur, as he turned away, “but soon, very soon, that heart cannot live without affection. Cast out, and deserted, where should she fly but to my love, so devoted and unutterable.”
Meanwhile, within the studio, a new scene of the drama was being enacted. Aylmer had shut the door, and quickly approached Juliet.
“You cannot escape me, now. You must explain the mystery which bewilders, while it charms me. I feel in my inmost soul that we are not strangers one to another,—yet we met but yesterday!”
“Strangers, no, truly!” she looked round sweetly, confidingly to him, as we look on the familiar features of a favourite brother.
“But, then, where, when, how did we meet!” he exclaimed, still more moved. “I
“Yet I know yours well,” she said, with her sweet smile, “and the tones of my voice, you have heard them many times.”
“It struck me so,” exclaimed Aylmer: “the first words I heard you utter, were like a strain of well‐remembered music, that long ago had passed melodious on my ear. But your voice, as we have all remarked, resembles so strangely that of your cousin Millicent, that I fancied it was her tones I recognized in yours.”
Juliet shook her head almost sadly, “It is not so, and it were best I should resemble her in nothing.”
“Do not let us talk of her, just now,” said Aylmer, impatiently, “but, tell me what claim I have upon your acquaintance, I believe I might say your friendship and oh! may that claim be a strong one.”
“I knew you were here,” said Juliet, dreamily, as though she were rather wan‐
“All! how much may be in that word!” thought Aylmer, with a thrill of delight.
“And you will tell me all now, then?” he exclaimed to Juliet; “the time is come, as you thought!”
“Not as I thought,”—her countenance assumed an expression of rigid decision, which gave it a statue‐like beauty,—“ I will not, I cannot tell now.”
“How!” exclaimed Aylmer; “you surely cannot mean it. This is unkind and cruel.
“Yes! but I knew not then that things would be as they are.”
Ambiguous as was this speech, he understood at once that she alluded to his marriage. How the poor heart of Millicent Grey would have died within her had she seen the expression of his face,—that of Juliet swelled with triumph.
Aylmer was silent for a few moments, then he looked up with a sort of calm sadness.
“Am I to understand, then, that you will never tell me the meaning of this hidden sympathy,
which draws my soul to you, as though you were some friend of childhood, some companion
cherished long? Am I to live near you constantly as the mere stranger, which, in the common
course of events, I should be to you, with the feeling half maddening me the while that
“Never,” she answered, in a low, melancholy tone, as though she had caught the reflection of
his sadness,—“never,
She bounded from him as she spoke, and went to the door, whilst he stood motionless with agitation and bewilderment. There she paused, and said, in a gentle, beseeching tone,—
“Promise it shall be as I have said. We
“I will do all you choose, it is but too bright a prospect. Make of me what you will.” He had hardly spoken when she passed from the room,—her power was established.
From that day Juliet Egerton and Stephen Aylmer lived for one another. It was as she had
said; the scheme of ideal friendship she had proposed to him was carried out to its full
extent,—he gave up all thought of the future, and abandoned himself to the charm of present
intercourse. They had much in common in their love of the fine arts, and their knowledge of
Italian life and habits. It became a settled custom
Their mornings were spent in the painting room, not generally alone. Mrs. Egerton was too
tenacious of the world’s forms to allow of that, but quite sufficiently isolated by the nature
of their employment,—Juliet painting and Aylmer instructing,—to hold such communion together,
as was little dreamt of by those around them. Day after day Juliet continued, unmolested, to
exercise her powers of fascination on her cousin’s future husband, with every variety of art.
She never did anything like other people, but her undoubted eccentricity seemed quite
justified by her remarkable beauty, which already rendered her so unlike all others. No one
ever thought of finding fault with the peculiarity of her manners and habits: she was in all
things considered quite unique, and that bright
They generally all went to ride together in the afternoon. Juliet was a bold rider, and
often, whilst they were all proceeding quietly together, she would seem struck with some
object in the distance, some rock or tree, or opening in the landscape, that gave the promise
of a fine view, and without uttering a word, would cause her horse suddenly to bound away from
her companions and career at full speed across the country, never pausing till she was lost to
their sight altogether. Some one must follow her, of course, in these wild flights, but
Charles, who never allowed his ease or dignity to be compromised by such hurried movements,
invariably requested Aylmer to take upon himself the care of his capricious sister, whilst he
remained in charge of the rest of the party; and Aylmer joyfully
She never, perhaps, seemed so beautiful as in that position. The picture was perfect, and entrancing to a man like Aylmer, the artist; and then as the sound of his horse’s steps struck on her ear, the slow turning of that graceful head, the glad smile breaking over the face, the soft entreaty to be forgiven the wayward fancy, were full of an irresistible charm to him that bowed the strong heart of the proud man to be the abject slave of that woman’s will.
Then they would ride on together, talk‐
But the intercourse of Aylmer with Juliet Egerton was not the less delightful to themselves—that it partook not of this higher nature; and they would most often rejoin their party only at the gate of Rookcliffe.
Again in the evening, half hidden in the recess where the piano stood, the promised husband
of Millicent Grey sat listening to the enchanting voice that was speaking, as he felt it did
speak, to his very soul in those wild Italian words; nor was he ever for one moment arrested
in his fascinated admiration
By solemn appointment, and for a solemn mission, is their responsibility laid on her,—even
that with her beauty and her winning manner she may make stern goodness lovely in the eyes of
men, and cause severe uncompromising holiness, to seem a sweet alluring thing; that with that
voice of thrilling harmony she may sing holy strains to fill the ears too often choked up with
a world’s fulsome flatteries, and by that soft charm in her aspect and her words, which draws
after her the hearts of many, teach men to listen and submit themselves the more readily, to
the sharp exacting lessons of unchanging
But again we say, woe be to her who ignoring or rejecting this her mission, degrades her loveliness to slave for earthly hopes, and perverts her gifts of manifold allurement, to win for her only an earthly love.
All this while Stephen Aylmer had not an idea of the complete revolution which had taken
place in his entire being. He knew not that in the secret history of his inner life, that
change had occurred which colours the whole existence, destroying all independence or freedom
of will, and which he
The power terrible in its extent, of an indomitable affection had risen up and taken
possession of this man, as the wild beast seizes on its prey with some tremendous grasp, and
now even as the victim lies palpitating and crushed in the tiger’s fierce
But he knew it not—he knew that he was living in a rapturous dream from which too surely he must wake one day, and therefore strove ever to put from him, all thought of that waking and its consequences, till the dark hour should arrive, and only sought the more madly to enjoy the present because it was so fleeting.
He knew that the presence of Juliet Egerton was life to him, and most bitterly,
passionately, did he regret that before ever he saw her face, one had come to stand between
them to shut her out from his life so utterly. But he knew not that when the hour of
restitution came, and he must go forth from that existence of fascination and excitement to
take another by the hand, and swear to love her only and her truly, until death, then would
this new power rise up within
He knew not this would be; for though often, as we have said, even with agony he regretted, that he was bound by other ties, before that radiant face came beaming on his life, he was yet a man of honour, and he never dreamt of abandoning his promised bride. He fully intended when the time originally fixed for their union should arrive, to fulfill his engagements, and become her husband; but meanwhile, since this brief interval was all that was given him of the intense happiness he never was to know again, he resolved, even as Juliet had said, to give himself up to the full enjoyment of the redeemless present, and let no thought of the future darken its exceeding brightness.
It never occurred to him how fearfully
He almost persuaded himself that Millicent was incapable of any very strong and vivid feeling, when he compared the quiet proofs of unutterable affection, which rose from the still deep waters of her soul, with the glowing words of passionate attachment which, under the name of friendship, came bursting from the lips of Juliet.
And, besides, whenever the thought came across him irresistibly, that truly this entire
devotion to another than his promised wife was unjustifiable,—he laid this flattering
Of course the Egerton family were not blind to the drama which was being played before their
eyes, but no one interfered by word or deed, or even by a meaning look. There were various
reasons for this. Charles having attained, by some intricate process, to a most real and
enviable insensibility himself, never thought that possibly there might be the germs of an
agony, even unto death, in this working tragedy, for
Further, there was a certain feeling existing in the minds of these three old young ladies,
his sisters, so perpetually in bewildered amazement that the world had not yet seen fit to
draw them from their immutable position in changeless solitude, which caused them secretly to
feel, that they had somehow been personally aggrieved by their cousin’s speedy engagement, and
although they admitted it not to themselves, they did, in fact, look on her probable desertion
by Aylmer as a retribution justly due to them. They, too,
In the heart of Mrs. Egerton the absorbing love of the child least worthy of it, had left room for no other feeling.
She saw that Juliet had won the heart of Aylmer, and that she herself in return seemed
devotedly attached to him; therefore the mother ardently desired their union, and was careful
to promote their intercourse. Aylmer was, moreover, precisely the husband she wished for
Juliet; rich, talented, and fond of continental life. As for Millicent, Mrs. Egerton had never
quite forgiven her for having come, with her bright, sunny face, and her clear, vigorous mind,
to contrast so unpleasantly with her own world‐worn, artificial daughters, and, “indeed,” this
fashion‐taught woman was wont to think, “Millicent had always shown herself very independent
of her care and advice,—so now, if she lost Aylmer’s affec‐
Mr. Egerton would have been obtuse, indeed, had he not perceived that there were storms
brooding in the atmosphere round him,—storms where she, whose guardian he was called, was fast
making shipwreck for ever; but, really, while the cook persisted in sending up such abominable
So ruminated the head of the house, and so speculated the various members of his family, whilst slowly and surely stealing along, the great agony of Millicent Grey came forward to meet her on the pathway of life.
But, oh! Arthur Egerton! what a glorious opportunity was here afforded you, of proving how
noble and how bright a thing the human soul may be, when strength is given it to suffer for
the weal of others! Why did you not come forward in this her hour of betrayal and
friendlessness, armed with the energy and zeal of your deep love, to interpose between her and
the fierce blow that was descending on her, by receiving it on your own heart? Yes! by the
holocaust of your life’s affection, you might have
But, to an earthly affection you have delivered up your spirit, and the darkness of earth has closed in round it,—mists, arising from the dust out of which your mortal frame was taken; so, cowering back in the shadow, you sit watching with a keen cruel eye, till flung out by remorseless hands into the desert of hope and of affection, you hope to find that helpless child, compelled to seek a refuge by your side!
SLOWLY along the path where she had walked with Aylmer on the night of Juliet’s
arrival, Millicent Grey went wandering alone. Cold and dreary was the scene around her, for it
was winter now; and nature without sunshine is like the soul without hope.
With a heavy and a lingering tread she walks, her hands clasped on her bosom, where the
chilled heart beats faintly,—her head bowed down with an earth‐drawn gaze, as theirs is bowed
whose thoughts unconsci‐
And now it may be well to see how it fares with her who must thus compassionless abide her destiny, and wait in silence the last shock of the fierce passions raging round her.
It may seem unnatural, but heart‐sick and full of boding fears as Millicent now was, she never yet had doubted Stephen Aylmer. Most guileless and most trusting, nothing could have shaken in her the belief that whatever he did was right. When she had given up to him her entire and unlimited affection, she did so believing him as nearly perfect as any may be on this earth,—herself had, with her warm imagination, gilded and painted her idol, and then she fell down and worshipped it.
Whatever he said must be truth. She trusted more willingly his words than his deeds, and
whilst outwardly, with but little
She believed this simply because he told her so; repeatedly and constantly he assured her of this, as in fact it was the only salve to his conscience at this present time, that he should bind himself again and again by his words, to fulfill the promise from which his whole heart was shrinking.
She believed that, in some way, he conceived it to be for his happiness that he should be
her husband, even whilst his very soul seemed drawn to Juliet Egerton,—it might be only
because he wished to show
It was with this thought that Millicent lived on; hope clung round that young heart and
would not quit it. Her own beautiful simplicity and truthfulness misled her in this matter;
for, judging by herself, it never occurred to her to doubt that if Aylmer had ceased to look
for happiness in their union, he would have come in a plain and straightforward manner to tell
her so.
This deep humility saved her from all bitterness of feeling towards either Aylmer or Juliet.
More and more gentle and patient, day by day she shrunk utterly within herself, and strove
only never to interfere with
So Aylmer, looking on this calm exterior, believed almost that he had mistaken, when
formerly he thought she was endowed with that most fatal gift—intensity of feeling, and
solaced himself with the hope which, in his inmost heart, he knew to be false, that she was
too insensible to perceive the extent of the new affection which filled his heart, or to
suffer by it. How appalled he would have been, could he have looked beneath that veil, which
the woman’s pride never fails to draw over her suffering, be it what it may; and seen in what
a chaos of utter misery the poor soul of Millicent Grey was wandering now, tossed to and fro
from doubt to fear, from present anguish to future dread. She was as one haunted with
It is impossible that the human soul should seek its repose at once in things temporal and things eternal; and since on earth alone she had sought to lay down that head and rest, when earth came to shake beneath her, as it rocks in its convulsion, the far‐off Home of the only Peace had become to her eyes so blended with the dust whereon she lay, that it was too dim and shadowy for her to grasp its promise.
But as yet she never let her mind dwell for an instant on such a possible consummation. To one thought only did she turn in her sad bewilderment, it was her desire daily, increasing to a passionate longing which well‐nigh absorbed her, for Stephen Aylmer’s happiness, to make him happy, with or without her, by whatsoever means, it might be his wish or will that she should do it. This was her one indomitable resolution; this was her polar star, which was to guide her through all the raging storms and drifting clouds. Patiently she would wait till he should show her how best this might be done. At present he told her plainly it was to be accomplished by a union with herself, and on this she relied; but if the hour should come when a sacrifice would be necessary, there was, though Millicent Grey knew it not, in the generosity of her character abundant strength to accomplish it.
She was waiting now for Colonel Bentley’s carriage; which came almost every day to convey
her to Milton Lodge. Neither the old man nor Mrs. Hartley had the smallest idea of all that
was going on at Rookcliffe. He was unable to go there on account of his infirmities, and his
sister but seldom left him. The only change they perceived was that Millicent was with them
more frequently than formerly. Poor child! they knew not how in her great friendlessness she
pined for their words of endearment and of kindness, for they both loved her sincerely; Mrs.
Hartley, especially, had become much attached to her; and Millicent fully reciprocated her
affection. Yet it had never occurred to her, to disclose her bidden suffering to the gentle
old lady. A genuine frankness of disposition, like that which was the great charm of her
character, is perfectly compatible with an extreme reserve respecting the inner life of the
soul;
It was now within a very few weeks of the period originally fixed, and which still remained
unaltered. Millicent was remembering how, when she last walked there with Aylmer, he had been
forming plans of taking her to Italy and anticipating her delight at all they were to see.
Would that bright vision ever be realized now? Should she really yet go there with him, as his
wife, and forget all the horror and misery of these few months, even as we forget some
frightful midnight dream? Whilst she thought of it and the soft voice of hope came stealing on
her soul, she perceived the carriage which had come for her, winding along the avenue below;
it reminded her how they had stood and gazed on that which conveyed Juliet to Rookcliffe, and
how in that hour her whole
Mrs. Egerton met her at the open door of the drawing room, and told her he was there, adding that she intended herself visiting Mrs. Hartley that day, and would reconduct her home. Millicent answered a few words which were heard by Aylmer, and she entered the room alone. We have noted elsewhere that there was a singular similarity of tone in the voices of Juliet and Millicent: it is a common point of resemblance between cousins, and in this instance it was so strong that it was not easy to distinguish between them.
Aylmer thought it was Juliet who spoke; he did not raise his head from a drawing on which he
was engaged, but as he heard
Millicent stood transfixed, as one turned to stone. The voice, the words, the deep full
tenderness breathing in them, all came to her with a terrible revelation. His
Words, she knew not how, came dropping mournfully, quietly from her pale lips, “It is not Juliet, it is I!”
If a clap of thunder had sounded in his ears he could not have started more appalled. He
bounded from his seat, he turned, he looked on her as she stood there with her white
half‐parted lips, her stiffening hands, pressing on the bosom so unnaturally still. The blood
rushed to his forehead, and a hatred came over him
He took both her hands in his whilst still she said, with her mournful gaze, “It is not Juliet, it is I!” as though she meant to convey some terrible meaning with those words,—and hurriedly, anxiously he poured forth in broken sentences every assurance he thought would remove the fatal impression his first unguarded words had caused.
It was strange that among the various conflicting feelings which naturally assailed him
then, the man’s pride most predominated, and his main anxiety was to prove to her that he
could never intend to be so dis‐
Then he passed at once to the subject of their marriage, and the more strongly he felt his
very frame shivering, at thought of thus placing an insurmountable barrier between himself and
Juliet, the more vehemently did he protest that he would not allow it to be one day or hour
beyond the time fixed; that he held Millicent bound to that period,—that he was longing for
the moment to arrive—yes, longing. He spoke truly when he said so, for the terror was upon
him, that if the delay were much longer, he should not have strength to accomplish the
sacrifice. He did long, that it should be
Mr. Egerton came in and reproached her loudly with keeping Colonel Bentley’s horses waiting
so long. Mechanically she turned to go,—it was impossible in her uncle’s presence that Aylmer
should say more, but he
“Stephen, you know that now and always I will do whatever you tell me is for your happiness.”
He let her go, saying he should himself come to Milton Lodge that afternoon, and when Juliet Egerton entered the room where he was once more alone, a few minutes later, she found him with his face buried among the cushions of the sofa, and his whole frame convulsed as it seemed with anguish.
He rose up, and reproached her almost fiercely for having deprived him of an hour of that only happiness which was so fast flitting from his grasp; he said:
“Do not ever leave me—do not, while my life endures, take from me that which is its light of day!”
He spoke as if his real life was to terminate when he was parted from her, and only an existence like to that, vacant and rayless, we lead in the darkness of night, remain to him.
Millicent passed Arthur as she went to the carriage—he watched her movements at all times
with a pertinacity which one less gentle would have resented. He caught one glimpse of her
countenance, white as marble, and wearing unconsciously that look of patient suffering which
we sometimes see on the face of a child when in bodily pain; he saw her, and the glad smile of
exultation passed over his lips—by every
She crouched down in the carriage with that bitterly desolate feeling which makes us shrink within ourselves—she lay in a sort of mental stupor, watching all the trifling objects on the road, and unable to think—she had but one thought distinct—she must do whatever Aylmer wished. But why did he wish it? He certainly loved Juliet—she was bewildered.
“My pretty Millicent, what is the matter with you?” exclaimed Colonel Bentley, as she entered. “You look as if you had seen a ghost.”
“I think I have,” she answered; for surely she had seen the ghost of her happiness, which was dead.
“Child, what do you mean?”
“Oh, nothing; I was jesting. I am only not very well.” She spoke very fast, as if in nervous haste. “I see you are engaged with your newspaper—you do not require me now. I will arrange your cushions, and go to Mrs. Hartley till you have finished. Where is she?”
“In the next room; but I would rather you would stay with me; you never disturb me, little niece.”
“I will come back to you—but you must let me go now.”
She had a longing to lay her aching head on the kind old lady’s knees.
“Well, well, go away to her, then; some consultation on woman’s gear, I suppose,—ribbons for the wedding dress, eh, Millicent? Never mind, child, don’t trouble your head about them; it will make no difference to Stephen what you wear: he will feel just the same, I promise you.”
She shuddered; what a different meaning she gave to his words from what he intended! She passed into the other room, where Mrs. Hartley sat placidly at work in her accustomed corner. She too exclaimed when she saw Millicent’s face, and asked her if she were ill.
“Yes, I am not well—I am very weary—I wish so much to sit here—at your feet.” She took a low seat, and placed it beside her aged companion. She sat down.
“And now may I lean my head against you?” she said. “I long so to rest. If I had a mother, how I should have rested now.”
“My child,—my dear child,—what can be the matter with you? You alarm me beyond measure!”
“Oh, nothing,—nothing,” said Millicent, faintly. The tone of affection overpowered her. She could not bear it.
“My own dear Millicent, this is no illness,
She started up in a kneeling posture, and frantically buried her face in Mrs. Hartley’s lap.
“Do not be kind to me, Mrs. Hartley—do not be kind to me,” she said; “I cannot bear it; be cold and loveless to me, as they all are; kindness kills me now. I am so friendless—I am so friendless!” Then the pent‐up agony burst forth, and she sobbed with an abandonment it was heart‐breaking to see.
Mrs. Hartley was appalled, but these wild words were significant enough, as a vision rose up
before her of the scene in which she had watched Aylmer and Juliet together. She understood in
a moment what was going on, but she felt convinced it was not yet too late. Only yesterday
Aylmer had alluded
Gently she lifted poor Millicent’s head.
“Take comfort, dearest, no evil shall come to you. You are frightened and nervous just now, but I will be guarantee for your future happiness. Don’t think me unfeeling if I love you for a few minutes; lie down on the sofa and rest till I come back.”
Millicent obeyed unmurmuring. Had Mrs. Hartley been really unkind, she was too much subdued
and humbled now to feel surprised. She let herself be placed on the sofa, struggling to
overcome her emotion, and the old lady went to find her brother. She wished to give him
certain instructions before Aylmer came, that afternoon; but she had rather a difficult part
to play. She knew that, if she told him the truth, he
Mrs. Hartley went and stood exactly before him; she looked him full in the face, he glanced up, dolefully at her.
“Sister, you have come to preach, that is as clear as daylight. What
“No, but there is a great deal of mischief going on, which you ought to prevent.”
“Please to explain yourself.”
“I don’t mean to explain, that would spoil it all. You must just do what I tell you.”
“Well, I am sure, there never was a man so tormented. But anything for a quiet life: give me my crutches, and tell me where I am to go.”
“Nowhere, you are to sit still just now.”
“To be bullied and driven into a corner, and put out of all patience for people I don’t care about, for I know it can be nothing I am interested in. There is no mischief here, unless you are worrying on about the cat and the crystal vase,”
“So you don’t care about Stephen Aylmer and Millicent Grey?”
“Woman! what are you saying? Give
“You shall not have your crutches, I put them away on purpose. Now, brother, sit quiet, and listen to me.”
“And what else can I do but sit quiet, when you have taken away my crutches? and am I not dying to hear what you have got to say, if you would only speak?”
“Well, you wish their marriage to take place, do you not?”
“Do I wish my head to be upon my shoulders, though you seem to think I have not got one?”
“Very good, then let me tell you that unless you exert yourself this very day, Millicent Grey will never be your niece.”
He made a feeble grasp at his crutches once more, but he was perfectly speechless, from astonishment and horror. Mrs. Hartley was glad of it, as it enabled her to tell him what he was to do, without interruption.
“Now, first of all, you are not to know what reason I have for saying this, or the meaning of what I am going to tell you to do. It is all a great mystery, which would just confuse you, if you were to hear it till you became perfectly useless. You are just to listen, and do quietly what I bid you.”
“I will! I will!” he gasped; “anything not to lose my dear little Millicent.”
“That is right; now all you have to do is very easy. When Stephen comes here this afternoon,
you are to tell him that it is indispensably necessary that he should go to London no later
than to‐morrow, to see your lawyer about the settlements, and that, in order to save you
trouble in the arrangements, he is not to come back till within two or three days of the
marriage, when he must bring down the license, and having said all this, you are not to rest
till you see him off before this time to‐morrow, with a
Colonel Bentley nodded his head solemnly, in token of complete acquiescence: he seemed still too much bewildered to speak.
“And you will do it all quietly, not seeming to suspect anything wrong, only very decidedly, so that Stephen shall be gone before another day’s done.”
“Sister, I will; you are very wise, and I will be guided implicitly by you, for this is an awful business. I am in a regular terror. Be sure you tell me all I am to do.”
“That is all,—he will be here soon, so take care.”
She had gone to the door when he called after her:—
“Sister, I am choking with rage.”
“Well, don’t choke, only remember well what you have to do.”
Mrs. Hartley returned to Millicent who, meantime, like a very woman. was reproaching herself bitterly with unkindness and injustice towards Aylmer, by thus allowing herself to despair of the affection of which he had just given her the strongest proof; when urging their speedy union. What right had she to judge from any thing but his own words, distinctly addressed to herself? Was he not noble and true? incapable of meanness or deceit? and it was but herself whose weakness and folly caused this fear. She had been relieved by her burst of emotion from the crushing oppression which had weighed upon her, and in the reaction of feeling, her generous heart returned to its boundless unassailable faith in the object of its worship. She was terrified that she might have led Mrs. Hartley to think any evil of him, by her apparent desolation, and she struggled to look cheerful as soon as she came in.
“I am so glad you have come,” she said. “I am sure you must have come so surprised, you must
have thought me very foolish, but I am only nervous and ill. I certainly have no right to call
myself
“Don’t distress yourself, dear Millicent, I understand it all. I trust, indeed, when you are his happy wife, you will have no cause to say you are friendless.”
These were soothing words to Millicent, and, by the time the Egertons’ carriage drove to the door, she was seated beside Colonel Bentley and his sister, conversing with them almost as cheerfully as usual.
Mrs. Egerton was accompanied by Juliet and Aylmer, and the three between whom so awful a
struggle was silently going on,
Aylmer had assumed that wild, unnatural gaiety, which is the surest evidence of a heart most
ill at ease, but he avoided looking on the face of Juliet, even as we shrink from letting our
eyes rest on the still countenance of the dead, so unutterably mournful in their ghastly
rest,—for she was the picture of utter despondency: a beautiful picture still, however, that
was never forgotten; and the downcast eyes that seemed weary of the light of day, showed to
singular advantage the long dark lashes that shrouded them, whilst the very contrast of her
present sorrow with her usual animation and brilliancy, gave an indescribable charm to her
deep melancholy. Millicent was so anxious Aylmer should not
It was impossible for Colonel Bentley to speak to his nephew in presence of the Egertons, as
an admonitory look of his sister’s reminded him; and, therefore, as the visit drew to a close,
he told him that he wished him to remain at Milton Lodge for dinner, as there were some
matters of business which they must discuss together. Aylmer looked beyond measure annoyed: he
could not endure to lose a single hour
“Well,” said Colonel Bentley good‐humoredly, for he was pleased at what he believed was a proof of Aylmer’s wish to remain with Millicent, “I will try not to be too hard upon you, and you shall go back as soon as possible this evening,—but come with me to the next room for a moment, and I will explain to you why you must stay a few hours to arrange matters with me.” He took his crutches, and hobbled through the folding door which always stood open to the other room, followed by Aylmer.
Juliet rose, and sauntered towards a table which stood near the door, but at a
Juliet had gained enough. She walked back at once to her mother, and urged her to return home immediately, so as to leave no time for Aylmer to announce his intended journey before they left Milton Lodge. She succeeded: Mrs. Egerton and Millicent rose at once. Aylmer only came for a moment from the next room to say that he must remain, on account of business with his uncle, but that he would be at Rookcliffe in the evening, and so they separated. The red glow of the setting winter sun had prevented any but Millicent observing the ghastly paleness of his face. Her own grew white as snow, when she observed it.
“He is suffering,” she thought; “but how?—for what cause? oh! what shall I do for him?” It
made her sick at heart to think that one shade of sorrow was on his soul. She felt that she
would not have sunk or even
Juliet seemed anxious to leave the carriage first: when they reached the door she sprang into the hall. “Letters, of course,” she said hurriedly, taking up one or two that lay on the hall table. She had a large correspondence, and never failed to receive some by each post.
“Ah, here is a letter from Mrs. Wilmot, at Richmond,” she said, looking at the address of one, which was half hid in her hand, and speaking both to her father and mother, who had joined her as well as Millicent. “I know what it will certainly contain.”
“An invitation’?” said Mrs. Egerton. “Yes,” said Juliet, “she wrote to me last week that she expected some of our friends from Milan to be with her this week, and that she counted on me to come and meet them. I shall be so glad.”
“Do you mean that you will go, my child?” asked her mother, “that you will wish to go?”
“I shall undoubtedly,” said Juliet, turning and fixing her eyes on Mrs. Egerton. “I particularly wish to go just now.”
“You know best,” said Mrs. Egerton, satisfied that she could not do better than leave her daughter’s fate in her own hands.
“And she shall do as she likes,” added Mr. Egerton, who was beginning to feel uncomfortable at the manifold proofs of there being something wrong in his household, and who had just sufficient glimmering of what was going on, to feel that Juliet’s absence was the event most likely to restore the peace in which he delighted. Mr. Egerton always thought himself ill‐used when any distressing occurrence took place in his family. Few men had known less trouble, but even now he talked of the loss of an infant long ago, as a most unjustifiable trial.
Juliet went to her room, and having closed the door, she deposited the letter from her
cousin in Shropshire, which had passed for that of Mrs. Wilmot, at Richmond, in the fire, and
proceeded to write a few lines to Mrs. Wilmot herself, saying that, if quite convenient to
her, she should like to pay her long‐promised visit now, as she doubted whether she should be
able to
“Do you mean to return before Millicent’s wedding?” he asked.
“I do,” was her answer, and the gleam of her eyes on the face of her cousin, was frightful in its malice.
Aylmer came in the course of the evening. His first look was to Juliet, as of necessity. Her appearance of profound dejection was unchanged; but the next glance, even with anxiety, was to Millicent. This was caused by a few words of Mrs. Hartley’s. She had followed him when he left the library at Milton Lodge, to return to Rookcliffe.
“Stephen,” she said, “I would say one word to you!” He always listened to his aunt with
deference and attention. “I would simply ask you if you are fully aware what a great peril and
responsibility
He was much surprised. Mrs. Hartley spoke with a sternness of manner quite foreign to her nature; he felt that she had some deep reason for so doing.
“Does Millicent feel so strongly, aunt? It has seemed to me,—I have fancied,‐that she was cold, almost indifferent.”
“Lay no such falsehood to your soul, Stephen; you cannot and dare not believe it in actual truth,—or, if you do, trust me, for once, when I tell you, that her life is bound up in her love for you. If the love is torn from her, the life will go with it. Look in her face, and you will see that it is already trembling in the balance. Take heed, the Sixth Commandment may be broken without bloodshed,—murder may be done with no wound visible.”
She left him so deeply impressed by her
Before he had time to announce his own departure, Juliet had told him in presence of the assembled family, that she was to go to Richmond the following week. Aylmer started with uncontrollable emotion.
“How strange!” he said. “I am likewise obliged to go to London to‐morrow.”
He then resolutely stated, though with an inconceivable effort, that it was in order to prepare the marriage‐settlements, and that he should return only in time for his wedding.
“Well, you seem both flying off at once, Juliet and you,” said Fanny, who excelled in inopportune remarks.
“But you will not be able to escort my sister,” said Charles, with considerable haughtiness,—“she is not to go till Monday, and you leave us to‐morrow.”
“No,” murmured Juliet, who had come with her noiseless gliding step close to Aylmer,—“here
we
She spoke in a low deep tone that struck on his ear like the tolling of a funeral bell: he
felt as if the darkness of night had come over his life, but still the solemn ominous words of
Mrs. Hartley recurred to him. It seemed as if in this conflict his senses would abandon him.
He could only cling to the recollection of the resolution he had taken. He was to go so early
next morning that he said his leave‐taking must be this evening, and he asked Millicent to
come and speak to him for a few minutes in the inner
It seemed to her that her long patience was rewarded, and peace was come at last; and though for a short time she would gaze upon that face no more, how blessed would be their meeting.
So she laid down her gentle head in very great thankfulness that night.
When Aylmer returned to the drawing room he found that Juliet had disappeared. Vainly did he look for her with utter despair in his heart. She was seen no more, and the next morning he was to go, without even a farewell.
IT must be a light heart, indeed, that can wake from the calm oblivion of sleep, to
begin a new day, without shrinking wearily from resuming the burden of existence, so gladly
laid down when the night brings its healing rest. Its peace and radiant dreams are like a
foretaste of the repose eternal, and there seems scarce energy to return again to the
life‐struggle; but with Stephen Aylmer this feeling had deepened almost to a horror of the
light of day, when the morning broke which was to take him from Rookcliffe, and terminate for
ever that period
He went out into the cold grey morning: the carriage stood already at the door, to convey him to the distant station,—it was fully time, there must be no delay,—yet Juliet,—Juliet,—was he never to see her again? It seemed most utterly impossible to go without looking on her face once more,—surely she did not mean to deprive him of his lawful right, a last farewell. Alas! perhaps, like himself, she felt she could not endure it.
Still he wandered into every room where he thought she might be, but found that he
His resolution once taken, he delayed no longer; he flung himself into a corner of
They were about a mile from Rookcliffe, when suddenly a sight met his eye, which caused his heart to bound madly: it was a groom in the Egerton livery, pacing slowly along on horseback, evidently in attendance on some one in advance.
Aylmer almost threw himself from the carriage, that he might distinguish whom he was
following. He was right,—the instinct of his true affection had not deceived him. That light,
elegant figure, that waving mass of golden hair falling on the dark garment, was not to be
mistaken. She seemed to let her horse wander at will with lingering steps,—she scarce held the
bridle,—it hung relaxed from the fair hands clasped on her knee,—her head drooped on her
breast,—her whole attitude was expressive of a profound dejection, which was touching and
“You may have thought it strange and bold, that I should choose to meet you thus alone, but I had to tell—it is the last time—never more.” She seemed unable to proceed.
“Juliet!” he gasped out. Her sorrow maddened him,—she struggled for composure, and spoke more calmly:—
“I have come here to fulfill my promise, that one day I would tell you all,—all of the sympathy that bound me to you, long before your eyes had looked upon my face. I could not,—I dared not,—until your fate was in all things too utterly decided to be influenced by words of mine; but now I may make a revelation, as men do on their death‐beds, for this is the dying day of our friendship, Stephen Aylmer.” He could not answer her, but his hand grasped the bridle‐rein convulsively.
“Shall I speak then?” she said in her soft thrilling tone; “shall I try to forget the present, the bitter unendurable present, and go back over the ages I have lived since then, to the bright time of hope when I believed you were a heaven‐sent friend?”
“Yes, speak,—speak,—were it but that I may hear your voice, so long as its sweet harmony is
permitted music to me; speak,
Juliet lifted up her head, and looked on the landscape round her; she seemed to throw off all consciousness of present events and cast herself back into the past without reserve; she spoke as one over whom glad recollections were passing, like the fair visions of a dream.
“Bright Italy!” she said, “bright, sunny, gladsome Italy! as different from the dreary
winter scene around as the happy days through which we have been passing from those which are
to come, Stephen! When I first went there, I passed through its scenes of beauty and gay
amusement as light and free of heart as any on this earth. Aylmer, I was what you were many
years of your life, I had never seen one in this world whom my soul could call—friend. Many
there were who professed to love me,—many to whom, in truth, I was too dear,
“You tell me but what I heard of you everywhere,” said Aylmer: “I know you were the worshipped of many hearts.”
“And I was to all indifferent and unloving. I smiled and scoffed most carelessly at all. I
ever felt that till I encountered one whose spirit could meet with my spirit in a communion of
thought, of feeling, and of sympathy, I must be alone,—and so I was most lonely, with a very
world at my feet. One day, I went to an exhibition of pictures, most of them were by old
masters, some few by modern artists. I paused before a splendid painting, which I believed,
from its vigour, its rich colouring, its deep meaning and sublimity, to be the work of one who
lived in ancient and more noble
“I also believe the same; and I too hold that faith,” said Aylmer.
Juliet continued: “The Marchesa L——, with whom I was then living, was at my side, and as I
gazed upon the picture, I stretched out my arm to it, and I said—‘Would that I could step back
over the ages that have passed away since the hand that traced those lines has mouldered into
ashes! Then would I take it in my own and sit down at his feet, and give to him my heart and
“What! it was to you, then, I owed that day of triumph,” exclaimed Aylmer. Her bright smile flashed upon him in answer.
“You remember,” she continued, “how a party of the noblest cavaliers, accom‐
“And it was your voice I then heard?” exclaimed Aylmer; “it was your words that sounded to me, then, the sweetest I had ever listened to! I understand it all.”
“Not all, as yet—would it were all, in truth. Do you remember, after that, how the Marchesa
L—— came to your studio day after day to have her portrait taken, and how there was ever with
her one closely veiled, who spoke with you in your own English tongue, to her unknowns. so
that we held sweet converse, most intimate and
“Juliet!” exclaimed Aylmer, starting, as though stung by a serpent; “you do not mean that you were that mysterious friend whose face I never saw—but who so linked my soul to hers, that had I not believed her, as I was told she was, the wife of another man, I never would have left Rome, I verily believe, without her?”
“And who told you she was another man’s wife? Ugo Bartoli, who, for my sake, now inhabits a madhouse on the banks of the Arno; for he loved me, and, like all the others, loved in vain. I learned he had told you this, when you suddenly left Rome, without even a farewell. But I took no measures to undeceive you then, for I knew that we should meet again in England—I knew we should meet, because I willed it.”
“And we did meet—but how?” exclaimed
“Forgive—forgive me!” said Juliet, imploringly, with that tone which the French so admirably
renders, “
“Friends!” echoed Aylmer. “Alas how much more—now, at least!”
“And then you left me; but, as I said, I knew that we should meet; and when I
“I did come, and I saw you once again: I saw you my
“Oh, what have I to do speaking thus to you! What am I doing here,—what am I saying! Let me go—let me go!”
She struck her horse violently as she spoke, and the startled animal attempted to bound forward, but Aylmer threw himself upon the bridle and arrested his progress.
“Juliet, hear me,—hear me!” he exclaimed.
Her only answer was—“Let me go,—let me go!”
There was the utmost wildness in her eyes, and something almost of frenzy in her tone and manner. With her weak hand she struggled to make him quit his hold on her bridle‐rein. Again she struck the fiery horse, and the animal, furious at the restraint which prevented him from springing forth, reared and plunged so violently that at the risk of Juliet’s life and his own, could Aylmer have alone restraincd his grasp. He exclaimed only in a tone almost of defiance—
“Juliet, we shall meet at Richmond!”
His hold relaxed; with one tremendous bound the horse darted off at the most fearful speed.
He saw but for an instant the flash of her golden hair borne back by the wind; he heard but
the rustle of her garments, as though one driven by the tempest
But they met again at Richmond.
THE period which elapsed between Aylmer’s departure, and that appointed for his
marriage, was well‐nigh the happiest of Millicent’s life. She was so calm and fearless now,
living on one bright hope. Aylmer’s words had allayed every doubt, chased away every shadow;
in her beautiful trust she received from them the full assurance they were meant to convey,
and the storm of terror and anxiety through which she had passed served but to deepen, if
aught could deepen, the intensity of her affection for him.
It was for this very reason that Mrs. Hartley now trembled for her. Even whilst her prospect
of happiness seemed most assured, this wise friend felt convinced that some heaven‐sent blow
would come to hurl her from her false unhallowed rest. She judged not so from any outward
circumstance, but because she had deeply studied that Mystery of Love, the chastening of man,
which is appointed to draw him out of the snare which his own deceived heart sets for him in
this world. She had learnt that when human souls are so allured by the green and smiling earth
as to lie down there amongst its flowers, instead of seeking to struggle up the steep and
narrow path that
She saw that Millicent was resting now so utterly in this world’s good,—its highest good truly, but still an earthly treasure only, that she felt sure by some violent wrestling would the cords be broken, which charmed her spirit back from the pure sphere for which it was created.
Millicent was much at Milton Lodge. She dearly loved Mrs. Hartley, and it was music to her ear when Colonel Bentley called her his niece, or talked of all she was to do for him when he had a right to her services. Yet, notwithstanding their constant intercourse, Mrs. Hartley never made the slightest attempt to lead her from her delusive rest in this world, to the Sure Repose. She felt certain that a deeper and more bitter teaching was awaiting her.
To Arthur Egerton also, this period was one of wild delight;—he was with Millicent constantly, and his heart was full of hope: whatever she might believe or think, he knew by the tempest of his own soul, that the power which was now at work in the breast of Stephen Aylmer would, assuredly, sooner or later; fling her out from thence, as the rock repels the bounding wave that strikes against it.
A man must have known the influence of stirring passions before he can rightly picture their effect in others.
There are certain matter‐of‐fact persons; such as Mr. Egerton, who, being incapable of
feeling strongly themselves, are very apt to reason, with individuals struggling and suffering
as Aylmer was now, much as though they stood looking on at a man roasting in a fire, and
assured him that he was by no means too hot. But Arthur was able to form a perfectly just
estimate of
Arthur had discerned with equal acuteness the real state of Juliet’s feelings with regard to
Aylmer. But he trusted that vanity and self‐interest would make her eager to win him as though
she loved him; for she did
She had heard of the power which mere beauty could exercise over him, and with the
perverseness and personal ambition of a true woman, she was resolved that without this
advantage she would charm him, and break down the strongholds of his indifference. In the
course of her intercourse with him, which she has herself described, she could not but feel a
certain admiration for his
She at once therefore decided that she would marry him; and when, on arriving at Rookcliffe,
she found that he was the promised husband of her cousin,—this only gave to her design, and
the subtle mode in which it was to be worked out, the additional zest
In truth, there was nothing Juliet so much delighted in as a difficult enterprise of this kind, where she had to exercise her intriguing powers, and that capacity for acting a part which would have made her an admirable diplomatist, had she been a man. As has been seen, she had never for a moment relaxed in her task, and now her design was fast ripening to the ultimate triumph.
And this was the being for whom Stephen Aylmer was wildly longing to sacrifice the deep mine of true and noble love which Millicent Grey had offered him! It is often so seen in the world.
Millicent’s wedding day was also to be that of her coming of age, and it was within a
fortnight of the period when Juliet returned to Rookcliffe. Aylmer himself was to
Juliet returned from Richmond, looking sad and depressed, for it was quite necessary that
Aylmer should hear it remarked that she seemed unhappy when she herself arrived. She never
mentioned him, however, and Millicent, in her great guilelessness, did not for a moment
suspect that they had met. Arthur knew it, however, by the instinct
On the day when Stephen was expected, Juliet received, as usual, various letters, handed to her by her father across the breakfast table. Arthur’s keen eyes detected one in Aylmer’s handwriting,—he admired the coolness with which his sister slipped it unread into her pocket; and when, later, he saw her again, after she had spent an hour alone, he scrutinized her expression eagerly, that he might gather from it some clue to the contents of the letter.
He saw that those gleaming eyes were full of triumph, and yet there was a restlessness and
anxiety in her whole appearance, which seemed to indicate a painful suspense;—there was, too,
a deepening bitterness in the look of deadly hate which she was for ever casting askance on
Millicent, which considerably alarmed him. Still, he felt within himself a strength to hew
down all ob‐
Aylmer was to arrive rather late in the evening, so that the whole party were assembled in the drawing‐room to receive him.
The Egerton family were certainly rather remarkable than otherwise for their obtuseness, but they must have been dense indeed, if each and all had not felt that there would be fierce work in the destinies of those gathered round the hearth that day, and that the hour now fast approaching, was one which would cast its shadow through many lives.
When the sound of the carriage‐wheels announced that he, so deeply loved, so madly
Mr. and Mrs. Egerton came forward, and welcomed him; he gave his hand mechanically,—his lips moved, but he spoke not, nor had he power seemingly to avert one moment the strained agonizing look. Some one placed a chair for him,—he sat down,—his hands fell powerless by his side, and all the life within him seemed gathered into that gaze, fixed as though the object on which he looked had turned him to stone. It was a most painful scene, well nigh insupportable even to the parties least concerned.
It roused the father of the family himself to action,—he made an effort to speak.—“Come, Millicent, you are very slow to welcome our friend on his arrival; do you not see he is tired, come and speak to him.”
She rose trembling, and advanced with hesitating steps,—her movement did at last
When their spell was taken from Milli‐
Out into the dark night, she knew not where,—she fell at the foot of an old oak tree; down,—down on her knees, crouching, her face in her hands,—moaning as the wind moans at night, deep sobs at intervals rising from the breaking heart,—the whole frame shaking as the storm drove through her soul like a reed in the tempest.
“Was it come to this! was it come to
“Millicent, I have long foreseen this hour,—I knew it would come,—it has been preparing these many months,—it is the crisis of your destiny; but you must be strong, you must arise and act; it will not avail you to lie mourning here.”
She looked up to him through her long disheveled hair with the most beseeching childlike gaze.
“Arthur, I am so bewildered,—I am so lost,—I can scarcely tell what has happened;—no one
spoke to me, and yet my. very soul seemed shattered suddenly. No
“No, there is no dream, but stern, cruel reality. I will tell you all, Millicent, I will befriend you in this hour, and he alone can be a friend who tells you truth to‐night;—take courage then and hear it.” His voice now swelled out with exultation. “It is that Stephen Aylmer loves my sister Juliet as never man, save one, has loved before.”
She shrieked out piteously at these words, and writhed as though he had driven a knife into her breast.
“Yet more,—it is—that he now hates you for her sake.”
Again the scream, the anguish as of a new made wound.
“Millicent, you will not endure this—you will rise and act; you will not let him trample on you?”
“No, never, never!” she exclaimed,
All her long tenderness for him came gushing round her heart, so that she could not endure to admit the truth. She was like a drowning man, clinging to some last frail shred of the breaking rope, who well knows the whelming waters are about most surely to sweep him away for ever.
“Do you wish a proof?” said Arthur; “you shall have it. I will bring you a proof that would shake the maddest unbelief—a proof in Stephen Aylmer’s own handwriting: do you require this?—then you shall see it.” He thought of the letter Juliet had that day received.
“Yes, yes!” said Millicent, wildly; “bring me this, and when I have seen it, then for ever
will I rid him of my presence: never more shall he look on me
She knelt down again, and laid her head on the root of the tree.
“Not here, Millicent, the night is so dark and cold: it will chill you.”
“Here! I will not—I cannot stir, till I have seen it. Arthur, do not trifle with me; remember, there is a life at stake. What darkness is like to the darkness of my soul? What chill like to that which lies at my heart? Go.”
He saw she was resolute, and went; he did not for a moment doubt that Juliet would readily
entrust him with the letter, when she knew for what purpose it was intended, nor was he less
certain that it would be of a nature to accomplish most fully the desired effect upon
Millicent, even were it but a despairing farewell. The revelation of Aylmer’s hopeless love
for Juliet would be
He found that both Juliet and Aylmer had left the drawing‐room; but when he asked for his
sister, Anne told him she was in her room alone. He went thither, and knocked at the door;
Juliet called to him to come in, and he entered, closing the door behind him. He had never
seen her look more lovely, than as she sat there, dressed in flowing white garments, leaning
her fair head against the high‐backed chair of crimson velvet; her brilliant eyes were full of
thought; her small white hands wandering restlessly among the long hair that was twining round
them. Arthur paused for a moment to look on, and to rejoice, with a fierce exultation, in her
glorious beauty. Therein was his hope: this it was that had worked for him so well. Then he
advanced to her, and stood before her, fixing his freezing gaze on her face. Juliet and Arthur
They had throughout felt sure of one another’s assistance in any emergency, because both were conscious of their entire community of interests; and they knew likewise that there was much similarity of character between them in the determined resolution which they had to carry on their own designs, in spite of overwhelming obstacles.
Thus when Arthur came to claim his sister’s aid at a moment so critical to both of them, he spoke, and she listened more as if it were the continuation of a direct and open intercourse, than the first breaking in upon the meaning silence they had hitherto maintained.
It was not a time for delay. Arthur spoke hurriedly; and he saw, by Juliet’s kindling eye, that her thoughts flew faster than his words.
“Juliet, the moment for action is come; all is at stake this night: if we are prompt and vigorous, the game is ours. Millicent requires but to be convinced, beyond the possibility of a doubt, that Aylmer so loves you, as well nigh to hate her for your sake, and she abandons him for ever. Yet more, she will, I am convinced, promote your marriage by every means in her power.”
A smile of triumph flashed over the beautiful face.
“But she must have a proof—a certain proof that so it is.”
“Poor fool!” said Juliet, with bitter contempt; “did she not see enough this night? Is she not convinced, when his own conduct showed him almost bereft of reason for very anguish?”
“Her heart is convinced, but she had ever given a faith strong as that of a trusting child to his own assurance, and her cry of imploring despair is ringing yet in my ears when she repeated that he had said no word to her, and for this reason she must have some proof that indeed his love was for ever gone from her. Juliet, such a proof you have! You received a letter from him to‐day. Is it of a nature to convince her, beyond the questioning of hope’s last lingering effort, that he has deserted her in soul most truly and most utterly?”
Juliet’s only answer was to laugh out exultingly.
“Trust me with it, then, for this one night, and the deed is done. He is yours.”
She looked at him steadily for a few minutes; then rose, took the letter from her desk, and placed it in his hands.
“I trust you with it,” she said, “because it is for your own life you are working.” These
words contained the ruling principle of Juliet Egerton’s existence; she believed in nothing
but that great god, self, which is so worshipped in this world of ours. It was the deity of
her own soul, governing her every action, and her faith was, that he reigned in like manner,
singly and alone, in the spirits of all flesh. This belief guided her whole conduct to her
fellow creatures.
But Arthur had his treasure, and it mattered little to him for what reason she gave it. He
fled down the stairs—he passed out into the dark night again. Far off beneath the old tree he
could see the faint glimmering of the white garments of her
Had the dark earthly passion that twined, even as a clinging serpent, round his soul, so
enveloped that immortal being in
Hark! even now that voice from heaven speaks, which, though varied its tone, disguised its sweetness often, yet never is silent in those tremendous hours, when angel and demon struggle for the deathless human spirit.
Arthur stood one moment only on the threshold of his home, that he might still the strong
beating of his heart, ere he fled onwards to use on the writhing soul of her loved the
instrument of torture he would have purchased with his life’s blood; and in that moment, borne
towards him by the obedient wind, floating—floating to his charmed ear, there came the ringing
music of the sweet church chimes, that, night by
Sweet and clear, chiming gladly, softly, through the thrilling air, they came like faint and far‐off echoes of the harmony celestial that was heard in that Glorious Night of Wonder, when angel voices, loud exulting, filled the high arch of heaven with melody, unheard before or since.
Those sounds—those sounds sweeping from heaven on his heart, they bore him back long years to his infant days of deep belief, when in the child’s pure mind the Light Divine reigned bright and glorious, shedding a lustre over earth and heaven, and making glad the tomb which he was taught to know was Eden’s gate.
All, all was darkness now—earthly ambition, evil passions, love idolatrous, like foul mists,
had arisen to spread in blackness through his spirit, and chase away the beams from the
eternal sun; but still the
He passed his shaking hand across his forehead,—one moment he must pause, before he went to consummate that fellow‐creature’s destiny, to seal it with the seal of deep despair.
He stayed the feet that swiftly would have flown towards her, and turned another way; he
plunged down into the thick plantation, where the wind was only sporting wildly with the dead
leaves and the withered flowers, and the angel and the demon went by his side, as he ran on
frantically through the deep mazes of the wood; and it was as though both spoke to him with
urgent warning and entreaty, the angel, in accents sweeter than ever to our ears the voice we
love the best on earth,
Distracted by these contending thoughts, he stood—hearing on the one side the ringing chimes
so sweet and solemn, and on the other the shrieking of the mournful blast, whose withering
melancholy fills us with such a horror of suffering. Irresolute he stood; the courage failed
him to accept the sublime and noble office offered to him now,
It was so with Arthur Egerton to‐night. Too long he lingered, doubting, shrinking
Suddenly the sweet chimes died upon the still soft air; they had spoken their mission to the world, and were hushed again, and with them, like a vision, passed the memory of childhood’s holy faith, and the purity of childhood’s radiant hope in paradise. Only the man’s deep love was raging through his heart—the man’s fierce jealousy and earth‐bound wishes; no sound came to him now, save the howling blast that ever seems like the great voice of the world lamenting for its universal woe, and borne with it he fancied he could hear the cry of Millicent, beseeching him to hasten to her.
Oh! wherefore was he lingering here, letting slip the hour when it was given him to
accomplish that for which he had been so madly longing these many months? He had no thought
for heaven, nor hope within it, and earth had but one good, and that
Back, back through the tangled wood he flew, no longer undecided, resolute in will, and the demon hurried with him; but the angel spread his snow‐white wings, and soaring up through the soft dark air, took his course heavenward. Again would he visit, perhaps, the wayward soul; but fainter—fainter ever would his voice be, while bolder and more daring should the demon‐whisper sound.
Millicent lay where he left her; it might be she had really called him, for her suspense was intolerable. She started up as he came near; she flung back the dripping hair, soaked with the night‐dew, from her pale sad countenance—she fixed on him eyes that were strangely bright and clear; that strength and energy were within her now which ever come to us at the crisis of our fate, however feeble we may feel in its anticipation.
“Have you brought it?” she said: her voice was strained and unnatural, but perfectly calm.
“I have it—it is here, in this letter.”
“Give it me.”
“You cannot read it thus in the darkness.”
“There is a light—let us go to it;” she pointed to the lamp which hung in the porch at Rookcliffe. He walked towards it, and she followed; he heard her light footsteps, her quick half‐suffocated breathing—yes, she followed him—his heart swelled with a fierce exultation. Already was the charm at work—he was drawing her after him by the power of her despair.
They came and stood within the old stone porch; the light fell strongly around them. Without
a word, Millicent took the letter from Arthur’s hands, and, standing upright, proceeded to
read it through. He had meant to have said so much to her
So she finished it, and flung it from her. Arthur saw that all the woman was in those eyes
again, as she raised them with passionate imploring agony to heaven,—in
“Millicent, Millicent!”—he bent himself before her in an agony of supplication,—“other love than his awaits you, deeper, deeper than the soul of man hath yet conceived till now.”
His words were too wild, too incoherent for a record here, but he told her all, all he had felt and suffered for her sake,—he poured out his whole feeling heart before her, and then he waited her answer, as one sinking with the roar of many waters in his ears, awaits the voice responding to his cry for help.
She seemed to have heard him speak;
With that she turned and fled. He saw her bound through the open door into the hall,—he
heard her echoing steps along the passages in frantic haste, and she was gone. And was this
all?—was it thus she had received the offering of his whole soul,—the full avowal of his
unchanging, unreserved, unbounded love?—with but that wild and fearful blessing, that he had
saved her from inflicting pain on that other, not more unworthy than beloved! For a moment his
heart sickened within him,—then he saw and understood, that truly her soul
It mattered not, his time was coming. For ever broken were the links that bound her,—a shattered lonely tree, by lightning struck, she seemed. None would come near to tend and lift her up, save him alone. Surely his grasp was upon her! Who but death should make him quit his hold?
SHE was alone now. She bolted and barred her door,—she opened wide the window to admit the cold wind upon that fevered brain. There was luxury in this,—she was alone; no witness there,—visible to human eyes at least,—one hour’s indulgence, or her heart would burst. She laid herself down upon the floor,—she buried her face in those convulsed hands.
She shook and shivered as the storm of grief raged over her.
Many a grave has been dug with tears such as those she shed that night! sobbing—sobbing, heart‐broken, she lay prostrate. Often when the full sense of her misery came upon her the sob rose to a shriek; then died away into that low dreary moaning which has no words, but is the deep voice of the soul most eloquent in its unutterable suffering. So passed the first moments of this—her new existence—the life without hope.
Millicent! said we not well when at the vessel’s side you stood and looked exultingly on the boundless sea that swift was bearing you to the threshold of the world you so pined to know—said we not well that could you have foreseen this hour, you would have prayed the whelming waves to take you in their terrible embrace, and hide you in their chilly depths less cruel and cold than human breast?
At length for very exhaustion the tempest within her was assuaged: it was a relief to exchange the first gnawing anguish for the settled stillness of despair. Now when the free indulgence of her grief had done its work, she would think what measures must be taken in this her life’s emergency; so she rose up staggering, giddy with sorrow. Never more should her step go light and free on earth: she was aged with the centuries of wretchedness gone over her.
She plunged her head and hands in cooling water: she must have all her intellect and strength of reason now. Back must roll the tide of tortured feeling from her soul, whilst she stood forth with clear collected thoughts to resolve and act as beseemed the being he once had loved and chosen. A lifetime would be long enough to weep hereafter.
So she was very calm as she took her seat and resolutely looked her destiny in the
She looked, then, into her destiny in its new form, and this was what she saw:—For herself,
it was plain that all was darkness now,—above, around. She never yet had had eyes for the
light of heaven, and that of earth was gone. The sunbeams of hope and love had fled, and the
night had come. His love had made the world
He had driven her out from his sheltering arms, lonely to shiver in a wilderness, now bleak and cold. It needed not many words to describe her fate, now she was desolate,—desolate.
But in this shattered life did any good remain? In this most thick darkness was there a ray
at least of light reflected? Yes, existence had yet one good within its limit, and through the
deep gloom one beam yet strayed,—far off from her, and powerless to warm her poor, chilled
heart, as the fair
That was the one, pale flower that only had not withered, when this night made such fierce havoc, in the blooming Eden of her past existence: all the sweet blossoms that were wont to spring around her feet had perished when her sun of hope went down; and this alone remained to be the object of her care, and deep solicitude,—the last light to live for in the darkness of that desert; so that her existence was now gathered up into this one thing,—the wish, and, as a necessary result, the active effort, for his happiness.
It was evident that much depended upon herself now—no other, in fact, could promote his union with Juliet Egerton. Therefore bending the strong powers of her soul to this one object, in that hour of calm and dear reflection she saw distinctly, as in a plan rolled out before her, how it was to be done, and his great prosperity, her complete adversity, accomplished.
She must do all—she must release him from his engagement, she must gain from him the promise that Juliet should be his wife; lest shame or remorse should deter him, she must obtain Colonel Bentley’s difficult consent; and, further, she must, out of her own fortune, provide Juliet with such a portion, as should enable them to marry without waiting for Aylmer’s inheritance, for she knew that Mr. Egerton had lived too magnificently in early life, to be able now to provide for his numerous family.
But further—and this was the fiercest
So be it; she was ready. She had given, and entirely devoted, her life to his happiness; and if he chose that, not by the love and tenderness of this life, but by its utter sacrifice and misery, the work should be performed—she was content to serve him according to his own desire.
One thing only she deeply felt was needful for herself—the whole must be
Millicent did not appear at breakfast next morning, but shortly after she sent
The mind of this unhappy man was now in a state of utter chaos; his affection for Juliet, on which she had worked during their absence with a fearful power, was now perfectly ungovernable, and yet he clung to honour, so long his ruling principle, with a frantic tenacity. To desert Millicent, or to let her come as a barrier between himself and Juliet, seemed alike impossible—everywhere insupportable misery appeared to be before him. The scene of his arrival at Rookcliffe showed that his reason was well nigh sinking in the struggle.
He knew by the quick instinct of feeling that this message from Millicent Grey boded a crisis; for with his dark night‐thoughts, since last he saw her, had come the consciousness that he had looked on her with hate, and that she had read that hatred in his eyes.
He sat in the library shaking in every limb, when the door opened, and closed again upon her, from whom he had won a life, with the promise of a love until death.
She came forward slowly, with that mournful dignity which invests most often the years of
widowhood. She had prepared herself for this hour of unflinching endurance: with what torture,
may none who read this page ever know! She had studied most deeply the part she had to play;
she had composed her features, settled her aspect as we straighten the limbs of a corpse,—and
truly her face now was very like, in its deep stillness, to the face of the dead. White it
was, and rigid as theirs, fixed in the same indomitable calm; for even as they feel no more,
so had she killed, within herself, the power of feeling, till this task should be
accomplished. In her breast, however, the viper only slept: soon would it rise to sting her to
the heart
They seemed to have reversed their parts,
But hers had been a noble love, and therefore she was ennobled;—his was a cowardly affection, a base usurper in his heart, and so he was a coward now. It is seldom that a man can read the depths of a woman’s heart. Aylmer misjudged her now, as many like herself are misjudged.
He believed her to be as calm, as indifferent as her outward aspect denoted, only he wondered to see her look so pale.
She sat down opposite to him: he guessed not that she did so because her knees shook under
her, so that she could not stand. Then the white lips parted, and she began to speak. Her plan
was to conduct this matter as though she were herself the aggressor, in order by so doing to
save him from the faintest shadow of remorse or regret on her
One who had learnt what poor Millicent Grey was never taught,—that all earthly feeling, though it were the most devoted and most pure, must give way, even in circumstances the most fearful, before the one unflinching principle of right, would have felt that not even the unparalleled generosity which prompted this course of proceeding, could justify the dissimulation with which it must be accomplished.
But her soul was blinded, because it had been unlawfully delivered up to the human
adoration. There can be no pure worship except it be offered to the Alone Good. She knew that
in utter singleness of desire her
“Aylmer, I have come here this day, in order to make to you one prayer,—one earnest request, which, although it involves the question of both our lives, I yet would say in as few words as possible, both for your own sake and mine. Stephen, we have both been mistaken,—you are as fully aware of it, I feel sure, as I am myself. There is no prospect of happiness for us in the union where we thought to find it. I have come to ask that you will give me back my promise,—that you will release me from my engagement.”
Thus, while speaking no word that was not true in the actual matter of it, she conveyed the
idea that, for her own sake, she would be free. He made no answer, for in
“I know that in withdrawing from you my promise to be your life’s companion, I am abandoning
my post, and renouncing the charge I had taken upon me, of watching over your happiness day by
day, and hour by hour; and, therefore, you will not think me over bold, if I speak to you now
as a privileged friend,—if I confess to you, Stephen, that I shall know no peace till another
more fitted, more worthy of your love” (her voice faltered in spite of her‐
He was now so astonished, that for a moment he forgot even Juliet and the bright prospect
opening before him, whilst he asked himself if it were possible that Millicent had never
really loved him. He could not conceive the possibility of such generosity, as she was in real
fact displaying, and the man’s vanity was actually piqued. Juliet had of late striven
earnestly to convince him, that Millicent was by no means in‐
“Millicent, one thing you will admit I have a right to know, even in this hour,—Have you, indeed, never loved me?—or rather,—let us not touch the past, it is sacred,”—there was some emotion in his tone, as he thought on the days when her deep tenderness was displayed so brightly to his eyes that he might as well have doubted the clear light of heaven,—“but tell me that which affects the present and the future,—do you love me no longer?”
What a question! It had been less
“
It was quite enough; he never doubted but that, unwilling to pronounce the actual confession that she had in heart deserted him, Millicent by this means sought to convey to him not only the assurance that in truth she did love him no more, but that Juliet had given him all that affection which she had taken away. What words could express the boundless joy that came to him with this conviction!—he could no longer restrain his passionate delight,—and why should he in truth? He believed that Millicent was as thankful as himself to be released!
All embarrassment, all gloom, all fear, passed away from his countenance. He rose up radiant with happiness; as if a new life were in him.
“Then,” he exclaimed, “if so it is, if you love me no more—and Juliet does with all the
tenderness, I doubt not, of her impassioned, generous nature—then,
In what inquisition had he learned to be such a torturer? It was most awful to her to see
how well she had performed her work. Alas! alas! to think that he
“Then there is no need to say more—it is all fixed, all settled. I think we have arranged everything—I mean for the future—for your life—for mine. Oh, what am I saying!”
He did not so much as see her agitation, he was so mad with joy.
“Yes, it is all settled! Think no more of it, Millicent—have no remorse, no fear!
It was Juliet—Juliet ever with him now; her image absorbed all other thoughts.
Weary, faint, bowed to the very ground, Millicent crept to the door; it seemed to her that now it was not required of her to live any longer. Then she remembered that her task was not done yet, not nearly done. She turned round to him again: her tones were now very low and faltering.
“Stephen, I have one more favour to ask! It seems to me that you may meet with many
difficulties—that there will be much opposition to your marriage with Juliet. I think that I
could remove them all if you will let me, if you will have no scruple. It will be happiness,
yes, happiness, to promote yours. Juliet has no fortune: my uncle and aunt, and Colonel
Bentley, might object; do not undertake
He hardly understood that she meant to carry her generosity even to the extent of providing Juliet with a portion, but her words reminded him that, in truth, it would be no easy matter to satisfy the various parties concerned in this change, and that most certainly none but Millicent herself could effect it.
He felt, therefore, deeply grateful to her for thus completing his happiness for him, even whilst he was confident that she did so in expiation of her own faithlessness.
“You are right, Millicent; there will, indeed, be difficulties which no one but yourself can overcome. You only can bring matters to a happy conclusion; and I do gladly and gratefully trust all to you. Blessings on you for the thought!”
That blessing broke her heart: she could endure no more, but rushed from him.
“Oh, death! oh, death! come quickly! Be merciful—come quick, and take me!”
Perhaps death would have been, indeed, more merciful than he whose selfish love now exulted over her final despair. Arthur, ever at hand, took her gently in his arms, and carried her to the next room, where he placed her on a sofa, near the open window; the cold air revived her at once, for she had not fainted.
She tried vainly with her pale, quivering lips to thank him, but her beseeching eyes told him she would be alone; he bent down, and kissed one of the folds of her dress, and then left the room. When he was gone she turned away from the light, and hid her face, with one long, deep sigh.
MILLICENT GREY did not rest long; repose in truth, there could never more be for
her, under the same roof with Stephen Aylmer. Her whole longing now was to escape from that
place, to fly and hide herself in some far distant spot, where she should never see the face,
or hear the voice of any one of those who had been with her in her days of joy, for ever gone.
Her resolution with regard to her own fate, had been fully taken, so soon as she decided upon
aban‐
For the few intervening days she would go to Milton Lodge: to sleep another night at
Rookcliffe was most utterly impossible. To be the witness of their happy love,
In truth, she dared not trust herself so much as to look upon his face again; she trembled at the wild longing that rose in her breast,—to fly back to him even then, to pour out the depths of her soul to him,—to tell him that none, none upon this earth could ever love him as she did,—that although she never saw him more, he must for ever be to her, the all of life, and hope, and joy. Yes, she panted to tell him this, at the very moment, no doubt, when he stood by the side of Juliet, and rejoiced with her in evident rapture, that he was free from a detested bondage.
Oh! how this thought stung her to the quick; it roused her into action! She must up and
complete the work that yet remained; she must toil on, on, unceasing, till her task was
accomplished; she felt
She rose, and went at once to Mr. and Mrs. Egerton; her task with them was very easy. They
were fully prepared for her coming,—the scene of last night, her interview with Aylmer, and
now the fact of which they were aware, that he was sitting at Juliet’s side, as her future
husband, sufficiently explained the nature of Millicent’s mission. They had arranged their
tactics with great ability. They said they had long perceived that Millicent and Aylmer were
Mr. Egerton could not help wincing a little when he found that she designed to give Juliet a positive fortune: she implored of him so earnestly to allow her what she said was her great happiness, and he was in truth so much embarrassed how to provide for his daughter, that at last, with a patronizing delight, he consented, assuring Millicent he only did so, because she said he could not refuse to let her make a wedding present to her cousin.
Mr. and Mrs. Egerton found the whole of their niece’s communication extremely pleasant, but
that which put the climax to their satisfaction was her declaring it to be her intention to
return for some time to Aix. This would so effectually prevent all
At her niece’s request Mrs. Egerton at once ordered the carriage to convey her to Milton
Lodge, and promised to come with her daughters to take leave of her before she left England.
They did not fail to assure her of their earnest desire that she should soon return to live
with them, but their words seemed to fall utterly meaningless on her ear, for she was
struggling with her own failing strength, to gain courage, thus to quit the place where the
Two hours had not elapsed from the time when she passed, in all her agony, from Aylmer’s sight, before she crossed the threshold of Rookcliffe for ever. She heard the murmur of his voice as she passed the studio, and shivered with the strong spasm that grasped her heart at the sound; but her attention was almost instantly claimed by Arthur, who stood in the hall, still triumphant, though, in spite of himself, almost terrified at what he had done.
He could not remain unmoved when he felt that he himself had been the means of driving her from her home, and casting her out for ever from the only happiness she had ever known. He had not expected this abrupt departure, and it alarmed him for his own future plans. He seized her hand, and exclaimed,
“Oh, Millicent, what is it you mean to do? where are you going?”
She turned round to him with a wild, unnatural look in her eyes, whilst a strange smile passed over her lips.
“Where am I going? Drifting down with the current, Arthur,—the current that flows to the deep, deep sea, where the dead have gone to their rest. Who can arrange his own destiny, or tell what it shall be? Do you not know we are all at the mercy of the waves on that fierce stream of life: for some, it has smooth waters, and they go safely down; but there are others whom the stormy billows seize and dash against the rocks, and there they perish, Arthur.” She flung back his hand as she spoke, and sprung into the carriage, leaving him with the terrible fear that her very reason was shaken by the intensity of her suffering.
As for Millicent, she snatched up, with a sort of frantic haste, a large shawl, that lay on
the seat, and wrapped her head in it entirely, so as to shut out all sight and
It was bitter to be roused anew to the conflict when she reached Milton Lodge; but concentrating all her thoughts on the prospect of that hour of rest, when she should quit England, she gathered up anew her strength, and proceeded at once to seek Mrs. Hartley, There was a sort of instinct which made her feel that here she would be thoroughly understood; that she need enter into no explanations, nor yet attempt to conceal the reality of her unutterable sacrifice. She felt, indeed, from many words of Mrs. Hartley’s, only now remembered, that she had known the truth long since, and that she would appreciate to the uttermost all Millicent had done and suffered.
The good old lady sat reading by the window. Millicent gently crept towards her and knelt
down before her. One look passed
“Dear kind friend, it is all over. I never, never more shall have a right to comfort him, or
bless him with my whole heart’s love; I never, never shall look upon his face again. How shall
I bear it?—my very soul seems dying in me! Oh, that she, at least, may love him, not as I did,
that cannot be, but so that he shall be happy!”—She could not go on. Mrs. Hartley was deeply
moved, and yet this was but the hour that she had long foreseen. She saw that as she had
expected, a message had come from Heaven to the soul of Millicent Grey, to tell her that she
had mistaken her rest and her vocation—that her rest could not be in this world, nor the
vocation of her immortal
She laid her hands on the poor drooping head that rested on her knees.
“Darling, I have long foreseen this hour; but take comfort. By this very suffering shall a sweeter shelter be provided for you than any human love—a happier home, my child, than any dwelling even with the most beloved—”
These words, were strangely soothing to poor Millicent, although she scarcely under‐
She said there must be no delay in this matter, for she had sent a message to Stephen by Mr.
Egerton, promising, that if
Mrs. Hartley at once proposed to undertake the mission, and said she would go to her brother that very moment, trusting earnestly that she might be able to prevail with him, so that it should not be requisite for her to call on poor Millicent to come and plead with him for her own despair. With one fond pitying kiss she left her unhappy charge, who remained still crouching on the floor, her hands clasped over her eyes; for when the heart is crushed as hers was now, it seems impossible for the feeble knees to uphold the weary frame, or the heavy head to lift itself from the dust where most it is content to dwell.
Mrs. Hartley had anticipated a scene of violence with her brother, and much vehe‐
Mrs. Hartley soon saw that she was quite powerless, and that the fiery scourge which had driven Millicent Grey to the accomplishment of all she had that day done, would not relax its cruel work till the whole of her bitter task should be fulfilled.
She went and brought her to Colonel Bentley; he was in the full paroxysm of ungoverned rage,
his angry passions excited to the uttermost;—his powerless limbs quivered with the internal
violence—his features were distorted—his voice, harsh and discordant, was uttering fierce
words of menace. Then she came gliding in with
As the old man looked on her the angry tones died away on his lips, the stir of the human feelings seemed hushed within him as though by the presence of a thing unearthly. His fascinated gaze followed her movements. She came and knelt before him, for it seemed the only attitude in which she now found any rest. Very humble does intense love and intense suffering make us!
Then she lifted up the wan burning hands, and began to plead for Aylmer’s happiness and her own entire misery, with an eloquence of supplication which these weak words cannot render.
No mother, wrestling in agony for the life of her first‐born child, ever found such
She entered into no explanation as to what had passed—she gave no reason for thus seeking to
place an irrevocable barrier between herself and him who had been the hope of this mortal
life, only she said it was for his happiness, and she prayed the old man by the dear name of
mercy, to grant her deep petition. She laid down her head upon his feet, and said she would
not rise till he had promised to send forth a blessing on that friend beloved, peace to his
heart, and the offering of the crowning cup of joy unto his lips. For herself, she said if he
would hear her prayer, she would in return devote her life to him—she would come back to him
when
There was no further delay, Colonel Bentley wrote the letter to his nephew instantly; it was
dictated by Millicent herself, and it breathed only love and kindness, and the promise that
all should be done to
But the life was still there, the strong life turned to poison; and when morning broke,
Millicent rose and made ready as for a journey. She told Mrs. Hartley, that great as had been
her strength for endurance hitherto, she felt now there was a limit, beyond which the power of
submission unto suffering could not go. To see again the faces of those who had been around
her in her days of deep joy—to risk the mention
Mrs. Hartley felt she was right, and that it was better for all parties that so it should be; she undertook to explain this very sudden departure to the Egertons, who, she felt convinced, would be thankful if such an arrangement were made; and in a very few hours Millicent was on her way to London, accompanied by Nanette and her servant. Thence a week later she departed for Aix.
As Mrs. Hartley anticipated, the family at Rookcliffe were greatly relieved at having her,
who was in truth their victim, removed from before their eyes thus happily; and as Millicent
came of age during her stay in London, all necessary arrangements were there made with the
lawyers, to
From the moment of her departure all seemed to prosper according to their wishes. Aylmer, with the full consent of his uncle, hurried the preparations for his marriage with Juliet, which was already announced to the world; and in the delicious joy of having obtained that good, without which it had seemed so impossible to live, and of which he had despaired, he drove from him all thought of the past, and resolutely closed the eyes of his soul upon the mournful figure, whose image, at times, would steal across his spirit, looking up at him with sad reproaching eyes, and mutely wringing her pale hands.
There was one, however, to whom the news of Millicent Grey’s sudden departure was for a
moment quite paralyzing; but gradually a little reflection taught him that
This was his hope; and swift as those of Millicent Grey herself, the feet of Arthur Egerton
were on the shores of France, but
AND what has the lapse of a year done for thee, old man? dweller with the dead,
companion of a corpse? how has it fared with thee, John Forde, in this long period, during
which the thronging souls of many thousands, have gone up to face eternity from the fever of
the life‐long madness in which they fed themselves with ashes? The year which has seen the
rise and fall of kingdoms—the convulsions of nations—the fading of many joys—the breaking of
many
The year hath been to thee a wild and mournful dream, passionate and hopeless even as thy
whole life; still hast thou sat there with thy head, now grey with age, bent down upon thy
bosom, while round thee have been the clinging arms of that adored corpse, the dead eyes
gazing on thy living face; the heart where feed the graveworms beating against thy burning
breast.
John Forde had been apprised of Millicent’s return, but doubtless all recollection of it had
passed again from his mind, too full of one absorbing idea to have the power of retaining any
other. He sat in his usual attitude as she came into the room the same day that she arrived at
Aix, and she paused to look upon him; for it was a strange thing to her to feel how thoroughly
at last she understood him! Albeit life was in one sense to her but a deeper and more horrible
enigma, yet, the secret of
She advanced and stood before him, so that he lifted up his head to look upon her,
“Oh, what and who are you that come to me,” he said; “pale and stricken even as she came, mourning for her first‐born, with death at her heart, and anguish in her soul?”
“I am her most unhappy child,” said Millicent; “and like her, I come mourning,—mourning for
my first‐born hope, which is a dead and buried corpse, and I would there
“Her child—yes, it is true, I now remember all, you are her child, and in agony of heart! Millicent, she will not sleep calmly in her grave if this be so—can I not comfort you? I shall hear her wailing through the dust for you this night if sorrow is upon you; tell me what is your grief, that I may soothe you and bid her rest.”
“Alas! she will never more repose if my anguish can make her restless in her coffin! I have
neglected your warning—I have forgotten your instructions, and therefore am I here a lost and
stricken being. You bid me never seek to make my rest upon the hard rock of a human heart, but
I have disobeyed you, and have laid down myself and my whole life upon it; and I have been
driven forth from that inhospitable home,
And she fell down as she spoke, abject as the despairing ever must be, whilst he bent over her in mute compassion, for there was entire sympathy between them now; their souls had met on the level of their common anguish; and the young girl, for whom the glory of life’s summer should but have been commencing, and the old man who was fast entering into the shadow of the tomb, were as one in their mutual desolation.
From that hour the life of Millicent Grey may be described in the single
word—
So day by day she wandered to and fro, the mute, pale semblance of a living agony. Aylmer had driven her out from his arms into a bleak, cold wilderness, and she was as a stray leaf blown by the blast of destiny upon that desolate shore.
She saw not the figure of him who watched her hour by hour, and ever sought to discover whether those despairing eyes seemed a shade less dreary, that he might come to speak to her of hope renewed; but Arthur dared not still approach her, for never yet had they looked up to tell his far‐off wistful gaze, of aught save love unchanging, even in its great despair.
One evening, when all was very still and lovely in the serene heavens and the quiet earth, Millicent Grey went forth in her miserable restlessness, to wander over the plain which extends beyond the fair town of Aix; and she dreamed once more, as she walked along, of that day to which ever her weary heart was turning,—the day when last she wandered the joyous bride of Stephen Aylmer, through the old woods of Rookcliffe,—before ever that fiend‐like soul, clad in angelic beauty, crossed her prosperous path,—the day when, for the first time, her eyes and his had looked on Juliet Egerton.
Overstepping the intervening anguish, she loved to rest upon that hour, the last of her
departed brightness,—the closing scene of her dead life of joy; and as she thought upon it,
all that she had suffered since, her intense, intolerable misery, of every moment,
And now, hath it ever been known that the sigh of one poor helpless mourner, by the hand of a fellow creature stricken, ascending up to the retributive skies, hath been answered from thence, in thunders on the head of him who wrought the woe?
We know not,—we can but tell how it came to pass upon this night with Millicent Grey and
Stephen Aylmer. On the selfsame evening, at the self‐same hour, that through the clear blue
air of sweet Provence, that deep, heart‐breaking sigh went up, Stephen Aylmer walked with her,
for whom he had committed murder on the life‐hope of a fellow mortal. In the fair
Beautiful as she was at all times, Juliet sought on this night to appear so to him
surpassingly; she so gloried in her own
She was wildly joyous this evening. He believed that she was so, because a few days more
were to see her for ever consigned to him, as his wife. How would his heart have revolted from
her, if he had known that her gaiety resulted from the delight, with which she anticipated
going forth into the world with a free independence, under the sanction of his name, to gain
the admiration of all whom her unholy soul might seek to
The evening was not calm and beautiful, as on the shores of France, but full of that ominous sultriness which often oppresses the air in the first warm days of early summer; black thunder‐clouds were passing across the troubled sky, and it was plain that a furious storm was brooding; at length a flash of vivid lightning rent asunder the thick dark curtain which obscured one part of the heavens, and the tempest, like a wild steed freed from the rein, came bounding forth in all its madness with thunders and with sweeping blasts.
At the first crash of that sublimest music, Aylmer drew Juliet closer to him, and proposed that they should at once return home, lest any danger chanced to her; but she was one naturally fearless, to whom the excitement of peril was delightful, and whose bold free spirit sympathized with those convulsions of nature. She loved to set even the elements at defiance, and to brave the very storms, for she had ever found her dominion over man so complete and boundless, that she dared control, from the powers of creation itself.
Instead of yielding to his entreaty that they should seek a refuge as speedily as might be,
she answered him with a bright smile of daring, and springing from his grasp, darted on to a
small hillock, which rose in a most exposed situation in the centre of the park; her swift
feet brought her in an instant to the summit, where neither tree nor shrub were to be seen;
He stood rooted to the spot gazing on her; his heart well‐nigh bursting with its fierce exultation to think that this being was his own.
Then her voice came sounding above the roar of the elements, sweet and clear as a silver bell.
“Take heed,
He answered the merry taunt with a smile as gay, and then bounded forth through the tempest,
to fly to her. She saw him coming in the strength of his manhood, beautiful he seemed to her,
and was in truth; noble the face and stately the form,—proud and free was the spirit
within,—he came with his haughty steps firm on the ground, his doting eyes fixed on his
earthly love. And then it was that in the still plains of the far Provence, the deep sigh went
up,—the breath, as it were, of the breaking heart, and straightway, in the selfsame moment,
from the angry heavens a thunderbolt came crashing down. It gleamed through the clouds, but it
tarried not there; it lit up the mountains, but it had no mission to them; on through the
boundless air direct to one spot, the fierce
No sight more awful ever passed in the face of day, for the form that stood upright in its
beauty and power, in one second of time had gone down to the earth as a shattered mass, burnt
and blackened, a quivering heap! She saw it lie there a human frame, as it seemed, no longer,
but a shapeless, distorted thing, horrible to see, fearful to think on; and wild through the
air her piercing voice rang out, shriek upon shriek, in her agony of horror! One moment’s
bewilderment, one moment doubt whether, it were possible that the proud, stately man, in this
brief passing instant, had, indeed, been transformed into that black mass of cinders and
ashes, where the stir of the life that yet lingered among
She had a horror of death, a horror of suffering, a horror of all which could render life,
to her eyes, other than a bright vision of triumph. To
They carried him home in mute terror and grief; physicians were procured, but they said if
he did not die at once, it would be many days before they could give an opinion; the great
dread seemed to be of his living, so frightful, if he did, must be the life in that stricken
frame. Then followed an interval of dreariness and mourning—the house silent and darkened—the
voices hushed—the steps of attendants only stealing to and fro. Mrs. Hartley came from Milton
Lodge, and night and day waited unremittingly on her unhappy nephew. Mrs. Egerton, too, was
ever at his side; but Juliet declared that her delicate frame could not endure such fatigue
and anxiety; she retired to her own suite of rooms, and there surrounded herself with
everything bright and pleasant, that could shut out all thought of the horrid scenes else‐
After a time, the fiat of the physicians was definitely given; Stephen Aylmer would live—but
he would live, blind and a paralyzed cripple: stone blind he was, and irrevocably so; he that
with such idolatry had worshipped the Beautiful, upon the beautiful never more should be
allowed to gaze; not only the sight was gone, but the very eyes were burnt up in their
sockets; nor was this all, a complete paralysis had possession of his frame. It might with the
lapse of time diminish, the physicians said, but the limbs would never regain their form, nor
the features lose that fatal distortion. So convulsed the frame—so seared the once fair
countenance, that Stephen Aylmer, proud and noble as he had been, was now an object moat
unsightly, from which com‐
When Juliet heard the final report of the case, and learnt distinctly that there could be no further change, she expressed a wish to see him, but that he should not himself be made aware of her presence; she was one who chose always to be convinced on any matter of moment by personal observation, and she desired to confirm with her own eyes the information she had received respecting it. If indeed, it were correct, she must straightway depart to seek for other instruments to effect her enjoyment in this life; and into the presence of him, now powerless to serve her, she never more would come.
So she went into the darkened room where he lay, and with no gentle hand
JULIET EGERTON left Rookcliffe the day after her silent interview with the man,
who, for her sake had bartered honour and truth, and righteousness; she said, that after the
shock her nerves had received, her health required an entire change. She returned to Italy
with her friend Mrs. Wilmot, and not many months after she was the wife of an Italian
nobleman.
The first word that Stephen Aylmer uttered when his speech returned to him was “Juliet;” he
had been quite conscious
Still, his first word of difficult utterance was “Juliet,”—it was to Mrs. Hartley he spoke,
who sat beside him; he had formerly manifested by signs, that he was fully aware both of his
irrevocable blindness and of his melancholy paralysis; therefore, she knew he would understand
her, and she thought it best he should know the truth of Juliet’s desertion at once. The tone
of agonizing anxiety in which he uttered that name,
The look of agony which settled down upon the countenance, already made hideous by its distortion, as she spoke these words, was too dreadful for her to look upon; she saw that he had understood his cruel abandonment,—he lifted up the one scorched arm of which alone he retained the use, and hid his face upon it, whilst he said in a tone that told how fearful an import he gave to the words:—
“It is darkness—darkness without and within!”
From that hour he sank into a complete and most mournful lethargy; nothing could induce him to utter a word, and he never spoke again for many months—he became as a mass of lifeless clay in their hands.
They might move him from place to place—they might try remedies of all sorts they might leave him alone or surround him with the gaiety wherewith they thought to enliven him, he seemed alike indifferent and unconscious of all; he had not yet recovered the power of walking, though it was hoped he might ultimately regain the use of his limbs, and day after day he lay like an inanimate heap, refusing to respond so much as by a pressure of the hand to the solicitude of those around him. It was as though the soul like the body were palsied for ever; no one could look on him without grieving that he had not expired altogether under the blow which had deprived him of light, and hope, and joy, and all but the mere mechanical process of life.
It seemed plain that this regret was so strong in his own breast, that he sought to be in
actual truth as one dead already; no word ever passed the parched lips—no
Fearful, indeed, to feel that the soul
Oh, the howling tempest, incessant, day and night, that raged beneath that lifeless calm
exterior!—the world and the things of it had been all in all to him, and from that world he
was now debarred as utterly as any captive, chained in some prison, fathoms deep within the
earth; but its influence was strong as ever, and whilst he lay powerless and like some
senseless clod—the ardent, earthly love—the burning ambition—ambition alike of joy and fame,
were trampling down his very soul with their mad impatient
Thus the days passed on for Stephen Aylmer, once as proud and noble a representation of humanity as ever mortal eyes beheld; the gifted genius,—the man of winning eloquence and lofty intellect, subduing many minds to his,—now cast there at the feet of any who came to look on him with pity,—a spectacle revolting from infirmity, piteous to behold, in his blind solitude and dumb despair.
It became necessary to remove him from Rookcliffe, whose threshold truly, his feet had passed only to bring dark evils in their train. Mrs. Hartley determined, for the present, to devote herself to him, though it was sad for her to leave the poor old Colonel, now half broken‐hearted with his nephew’s calamity.
The physicians recommended that Aylmer should be conveyed to certain baths, in a mountainous region of Switzerland, and thither Mrs. Hartley proceeded with him, as soon as he was able to move.
It was thought that the efficacy of these mineral waters, would gradually restore to him the use of his limbs, as well as his power of articulation; and this expectation was ultimately realized; but it was many months before any such result took place, and in the interval he was unable to bear an exertion greater than that of being wheeled in his chair from room to room. It was during this period, however, that the events occurred which must now be recorded.
The dwelling in which Mrs. Hartley fixed their abode was a solitary
It was impossible to divine all that might occur when Millicent should be made aware of the truth, but Mrs. Hartley was resolved that she should be acquainted with the simple facts without word or comment from any one, and that the result must be left as a problem which no human hand could solve.
She had deeply felt, throughout the whole of the strange drama, which had been played in the lives of Millicent and Aylmer, that powers, not of earth, were, dealing with them; she knew, by the instinct of those who have been enabled, because of their very simplicity, to draw deeply from the wells of spiritual knowledge, that this was a case with which no mortal dared tamper: clearly there was a struggle going on for the souls of these two living creatures, and the judgment which had fallen on Stephen, with the whole series of events now passing was but the outward machinery, of the hidden power that was working within them.
Mrs. Hartley would not venture to interfere by word or act in the development of their
destiny; she conceived it to be her part merely to sit by a silent spectator,—ready, if ever
human agents seemed necessary, to step in and befriend them both. This much of active duty
only she believed
And Mrs. Hartley wrote,—she gave a simple detail of the awful calamity which had befallen
Stephen Aylmer, and of his present condition. She quietly stated the fact of Juliet’s
marriage, which had just taken place, without even the delay that a mere consideration for the
forms of the world would have demanded, of her, so recently engaged to the unhappy man whose
sore punishment she had left him to bear alone. Further, Mrs. Hartley gave a brief account of
their present mode of life in Switzerland; she and her nephew were, she said, entirely
alone,—not only cut off, as they wished to be, from all society, but with only one or two
servants, as Aylmer could not endure the tumult of many per‐
This letter arrived at Aix one day when Millicent Grey was walking in the garden with Arthur
Egerton. It was now some time since he had made her aware of his presence in the town, and had
been admitted to her society; he had not decided on taking this step, however, because he had
perceived in her any indication of that
So far from that, it was rather because he had found it too great torture, to watch unseen
the hourly manifestation of the deep, loving faithfulness, even in anguish, of that breaking
heart,—and the longing to hear her voice again, to meet her sweet, sorrowful smile, drove him,
almost as hopeless as herself, into her presence at last. It was at first a great shock to her
to see him,—she thought it would be utterly insupportable to her, to look again one of those
who had been around her the time of her dream‐like joys—when she could lift up her loving
eyes, upon the dear face, for which she now pined, as one in utter darkness pants for a ray of
light; but after a time she found that when the mind is intensely absorbed by one great agony
of thought, no outward circumstances can much affect it. She saw that it was
Millicent Grey was one of those, whose refinement of spirit and instinctive purity of
feeling causes them to hold, almost as a holy doctrine, the sacredness of the one affection
sufficing for a lifetime,—it was to her a very sacrilege, to think of giving to another, that
throne within her soul where she had placed one only human being; what though he had abandoned
that high dwelling, and left her breast a desert waste, yet had she consecrated her life and
herself to him (woe to her that she dared so to do by any human being!)—and now it was re‐
Long before she had learned these things by her own experience, it had been to her one of the bewildering anomalies of this world, that any should have the power or the will, to admit two affections into their life; she would as soon have thought of holding two opposing creeds at once.
Millicent never dreaded, then, any expression of attachment from Arthur, for she imagined he must plainly understand this feeling, and share in it himself, and she therefore admitted him to her presence, the more compassionately that herself would have been so well content but to have received a like permission to hear the voice and see the face of him she loved, as hopelessly as she believed herself to be beloved.
She was so far right in her conclusion, that Arthur did read and understand the
He persuaded himself, also, that he was not so utterly mad, in refraining as yet from
despair, because Millicent gradually manifested some pleasure in his society. She did not hide
from him, but that was merely because she found a melancholy enjoyment in talking with him of
the days of her departed happiness; it seemed to prove to her that all was not a dream,—to
So they walked in the garden together, and Arthur was thinking, during one of the long fits
of abstraction into which Millicent fell perpetually, that, notwithstanding the exquisite
torture it was to him, to see the faithfulness of her soul to Stephen Aylmer, this was still,
well‐nigh, the brightest, period of his existence,—for she was his alone, at least, to look
upon;
It was Nanette who brought Mrs. Hartley’s letter, she came running as fast as her little feet could carry her; for she knew that if anything could have rendered the spirit of poor Millicent more desolate and heavy than it had been these many months, it was the singular silence which all her English friends had so long preserved;—she little dreamed their motive!
She believed that they had abstained from writing out of tenderness to herself, because they
must have communicated the
Poor little Nanette, who had been utterly bewildered by all that occurred in England, the
whole proceedings being most incomprehensible to her, had, after a vain attempt to discover
who it was she ought to hate for Mil‐
The arrival on this day, therefore, of a
“Une lettre, une lettre,” she shouted, pitching her shrill voice at some extraordinary height; “it comes, I dare say, from that detestable Angleterre (Je n’ose pas dire ce maudit pays, le Père André ne permet pus de jurements; mais c’est égal, je sais ce que je pense). Une lettre, ma chérie, ça te fera sourire peut‐être.”
It was not a smile, however, but an ashy paleness, which spread over the face of Millicent Grey as she took the letter in her hand.
She never doubted but that it contained the news of the final union of Aylmer and Juliet;
and though she did in all sincerity desire the assurance of that happiness for
She tore it open and began to read; Arthur watched her with a most inhuman exultation, for he interpreted the arrival of the letter as she did; and it is extraordinary, when a powerful principle, like that of his love for Millicent, is working in the mind of a man, unguarded by the yet loftier and supreme aim of inward rectitude, how it turns all other feelings within the soul to very poison.
Suddenly, however, his cruel pleasure passed away, and he stood aghast as he saw the wild,
changing expressions which were passing over the face of Millicent Grey, like clouds driven by
an inward tempest; he saw at once that some extraordinary tidings must have done this. The
mere confirmation of the misery, which she
Honour be to the true woman’s heart within her; she did not for one moment exult that Juliet
never was—never would be his wife, nor triumph in her base and heartless desertion, so
different to the deep love, faithful in uttermost despair, which came gushing round her heart
at that moment. No, she had but one thought in this hour, it was for his suffering; but one
desire,—to weep and to struggle, and to
“Millicent, what has happened? In the name of mercy, speak! say what has happened? Why do you look so wildly to heaven—what can have occurred? They are married, are they not? Aylmer is married! only say that nothing has prevented his marriage with my sister!”
The cold drops literally stood like dew on his forehead as the terror took possession of him, that some event might have occurred to prevent that union.
Millicent pointed to the letter, intimating that he might read it himself; then speaking rather to her own fainting soul than to him, she exclaimed—
“Oh, why am I here? What have I to do
She smote on her breast, as though like a guilty one, she would have breathed out her own confession of sin; and then bounding from the spot with the energy as of a new life awakening in her, she disappeared from his sight.
And he too read the letter;he read that record of the working of mysterious powers in this
matter, where he had deeply sworn he would accomplish his own will. He had been willing, if
need be, to accomplish it by the sacrifice of all that is noble or holy in the soul of man,
and by that unrighteous offering, it had seemed to him that already he had effected much, and
was likely to effect much more. He, it was, in actual fact, who had torn Millicent from
Aylmer’s love; his were the hands that dug out the great gulf which had divided them,
Arthur felt that he should lose that sweet presence now, in which he had lived, as we live in the warmth and light of the sun in heaven. He saw not only that she would go to Aylmer, flying back to him like the stricken bird to its beloved nest, but that even if he followed her there, it would be to see her so wrapt and absorbed, in but the mere fact that Stephen Aylmer was present with her, (though even still in heart estranged,) that never more would fall on him so much as one of those pitying glances for which his longing spirit pined.
And this just when faint gleams of hope were stealing, however falsely, into his dark life. Oh, that he could have annihilated the truth contained in that letter which he tramples under his feet now in frantic rage! But soon this first burst of passion subsided, and a feeling rose within him, which produced a complete though a fearful calm.
It was the conviction, joined to the indomitable resolution, that he must and would obtain
this, the object and desire of
SWEET and fresh as an angel’s breath came the mountain air through that open
window, and the music of nature’s deep voice was with it; a voice most glorious, the mingling
of many tones ever chanting the same burden, the great mystery of love. What aching heart ever
heard it and refused comfort? None who understand the language it speaks; but there are some
who do not, and Stephen Aylmer was one! The melody with which it sung to‐day, was the
He lay in the position which he seldom changed, on a sofa drawn close to the window; the
face scarred and seared by the scorching of heaven’s own fire, to that heaven was upturned in
sullen despair; the
It was thus that he remained day after day, taking no heed of any, manifesting neither pleasure nor pain at all that was done for him, yet making it sufficiently plain that he was not only always perfectly conscious, but that his unimpaired senses had acquired that acuteness which blindness most often produces. It would be impossible to conceive a figure more perfectly expressive of a rigid, mute, and dogged suffering:—in every line of that countenance, and even of that listless frame these words seemed written‐
“Would to heaven I had died!”
Mrs. Hartley sat by his side; and often the work which occupied her fell from her hands
whilst she lifted up her eyes to look
Whilst Mrs. Hartley thus pondered, she heard a movement in the room without, which was divided from that in which she sat, by a door, now standing wide open: what she heard was the echo of a faint footfall, with a sort of fluttering sound, and the whisper of a soft, sobbing breath.
The impression it gave her was as though some poor dove, with throbbing breast and failing
wing, had come wandering in, and
Mrs. Hartley took her in her arms, and let her lie there silent, feeling with intense pity the quick, fearful throbbing of that poor heart against her own. She said merely what she knew would give her a soothing assurance.
“I expected you; I hoped you would come.” And then kissed the quivering lips that had not
power to answer. Millicent lay very still in that kind embrace for a few minutes; but when she
raised herself Mrs. Hartley saw that her dilated eyes
“You are right, he is there:” her words sent the blood back to that heaving breast. Millicent tottered for a moment on her failing feet, but they carried her at once to the spot, and kneeling down, she rested her head against the wood which separated her from him who had trampled with cruel feet upon her heart, and to whom that heart was rising up again in this his hour of desertion and solitude, faithful and tender as the day he had first asked it from her,
It seemed to give her great rest and peace to remain there, in that attitude, and Mrs.
Hartley did not disturb her. She saw that she was becoming quite composed, and she waited
quietly till she rose and came towards her; then she drew her to her side,
“You said you expected me; then you will let me stay—you will let me be with him to watch
over him, as no mother ever watched over a darling child, to toil and slave and work for him.
His poor darkened eyes will never know who waits on him, and you could not condemn him to a
hired service in his sufferings—when such an ocean of deep free love is here! you could not
condemn me to such a death in life, as to know him full of pain, and wretched, and I not here
to soothe and to tend him! Oh, you will let me stay; surely he is my own, mine, by a love that
has no name in human words; mine by the sacredness with which his image has lain in my soul,
through all my night of gloom, unprofaned by a thought but of the most devoted tenderness.
Mrs. Hartley had let her go on making all this humble, imploring petition, because, in fact, she was almost suffocated by the emotion which that mournful pleading voice, and those words wrought in her; but now she exerted herself to speak.
“You shall stay with him, darling; it is, in truth, your place, allotted to you by no hand
of man. He shall be your care, and you his gentle protector, for he is helpless
Mrs. Hartley felt convinced, knowing how Juliet yet occupied his whole soul, that Millicent’s presence would be insupportable to him were he aware of it.
Millicent’s face blanched at the words: she most fully understood them, but she answered calmly, for she had that strength within her now which most women acquire, in time of trial for the weal of others, even when they are weakest for their own.
“Yes, I am fully aware he must not ever know it. It would deeply pain him, I
“You are, indeed, my own poor child. I do not think that there is any fear,” said Mrs. Hartley, sadly; for truly it was a heart‐breaking thing now to hear poor Millicent’s voice,—the dear, birdlike tones had died into so sad, uncertain a murmur, always weak and trembling, as though with the load of suppressed emotion.
Even as Juliet Egerton had chosen to look on the stricken man alone, when he was not aware
of her presence, so did Millicent Grey now desire to see him. The one had so willed it, that
in her cold, calculating selfishness, which seemed to belie the very woman’s nature belonging
to her, she might ascertain the incapacity of Aylmer to serve her any further, and then
Mrs. Hartley said she might go at once quietly in to see him, as the blind man, even if he heard a movement near him, would take no notice of it, and afterwards she herself would tell him that she had provided a new attendant for him, when Millicent might enter without delay on her chosen and noble duty.
So soon as the desired permission was thus given, Millicent rose. She was resolutely calm,
and Mrs. Hartley saw
As usual Stephen Aylmer made no answer when Mrs. Hartley told him he was to be waited on by another attendant,—it was to him, like everything else, a matter of perfect indifference; and Millicent at once quietly entered on the post, full of labour and suffering, which she would not have exchanged for a royal throne. She was careful at first not to let him hear the sound of her voice, but it was soon evident, as the days passed on, that he was beginning to observe, and to be pleased with, the unspeakable tenderness of the care she bestowed on him,—it was impossible indeed but that the atmosphere of love with which she surrounded him, should fail to penetrate even unto his soul.
Gradually he began to show by his movements, and the faint smile which passed over his face when her light step sounded near, how soothing and sweet to him her presence was; it was plain he loved to feel her soft, cool hand resting, as often it did, for hours together, on his burning forehead, and to know that her ever‐watchful devotion was around him; but as yet he had never opened his lips.
At length one day she ventured to read to him,—it was the only service his attendants could
render him, which always appeared to give him pleasure,—it drove away for the time the dark
thoughts which well nigh maddened him, and as Mrs. Hartley’s advanced age rendered her
incapable of performing it, Millicent was the more anxious to ascertain that she might so do
without risk of his discovering her. At the first sound of her voice he started violently, but
the very sight of this emotion
“I thank you very much,—I hope you will never leave me.”
Oh the tide of wild emotion that came gushing through her breast, as she thus heard again
the voice for which she had
From that day she read to him constantly, and was with him always. He spoke to her, but to her only, and that sparingly,—whenever any one else was in the room he was invariably silent. He became impatient of any attention but hers, and openly manifested the pleasure he had in her society.
No words can ever tell the intense joy all this was to Millicent Grey; it was greater even,
perhaps, than in the days when she had been his prosperous bride, for then she had not felt
that wearing sorrow which so enhances a return of happiness; and now, too, she felt that the
joy, mournful as it
But soon, to her unspeakable delight, his health began to improve greatly under her
unremitting care. He was able at last to walk a few steps through the room, leaning on her
arm; both Millicent and Mrs. Hartley soon became aware that this physical improvement, was
chiefly the result of some change which was taking place in his mind; an ingredient strangely
like the sweet leaven of hope, was plainly working in the spirit long so dead and heavy.—Hope!
but of what? It was not till
Yet that they were aroused in some way was plain; the intense happiness it evidently was to
him to have her near him; the eagerness with which he listened for her step; the mournful
impatience which tormented him in her brief absence; and
As these facts became day by day more evident, there was a deep, fluttering delight which stole into the heart of Millicent Grey, and there abode, making her often faint with excess of happiness; for if he suspected the truth, as both she and Mrs. Hartley were inclined to believe, if he had divined who she was, the discovery, beyond a doubt, had been one of rapturous pleasure to him. Oh, if it were so, how was her deep, patient love rewarded! What better, higher glory,—what dearer joy did she ask for life, than to be allowed thus to watch over him in his helplessness until her dying hour. And to do so not in secret, but with his own glad permission, were to make for her this mortal existence a very vision of delight.
But that even the hope, the sweet belief in the possibility of such happiness, was too inexpressibly dear to be lightly risked, she would already have made her happy confession to him, and learnt whether, in truth, her bright dream was to be realized.
Besides, Mrs. Hartley counseled her to wait with patience till Aylmer should himself explain what he really thought. When she remembered the passionate agony of the tone in which he had uttered the first word after his accident, Juliet’s name, she felt doubtful of any such sudden revulsion of feeling.
Meanwhile, most restless and most miserable was Arthur Egerton, haunted by the unhappy love
on which he had staked, and as it seemed, lost his life, even as a man is pursued by the
spirit of one he has murdered. Day and night, day and night wearily pondering, dreaming
hopelessly, he wandered on the mountains which surrounded
It was inconceivable what this unhappy man suffered at sight of her devotion to Aylmer, it
drove him well‐nigh frantic with rage. What! was his true, unchanging, fervent attachment, to
be treated with scorn and indifference, whilst the man who had crushed her with his base
desertion, who even now, perhaps, loved another but too fondly, was to receive unknowing the
outpouring of her whole soul’s deep tenderness, the offering of her very life! Stephen Aylmer
and he were more than equals now,
SOME weeks had passed while matters continued in this state, when Millicent on
entering Aylmer’s room one day found him in evident agitation. She herself had prepared to
come to him with a trembling anxiety, for they had parted the evening before, after a
conversation which had filled her with mingled terror and hope. His health and spirits had
continued to improve manifestly, under the influence of her presence, and not of her presence
only, but of some secret and sweet belief connected with
This decision, whatever it might be, was one full of rapturous joy to him, as every word and movement indicated when Millicent Grey was near him; but latterly he had shown an impatience of the silence she still maintained, which proved to them all, that concealment would soon be impossible.
The night before he began to talk to her of Rookcliffe, and she saw by the manner in which
he turned his head towards her, and the eager, watchful expression of his face, that he had
chosen this subject solely in order to discover by the tone of her answer, whether it caused
her any agitation;
A sudden terror had taken possession of her—she saw that he was about to speak again, and
she doubted not it would be to demand the truth from her, and she had hurried away to prevent
it, for full of hope as she was, that he had long since guessed the real state of the case,
and had proved by his evident happiness, how utterly her deep love and faithfulness had
prevailed at last over his wayward heart,—yet this summer‐time of hope had been so
inexpressibly sweet to her, that she dreaded any change, even were it to richer blessings; she
had known too much of misery—sudden, blighting misery, not to cling to the present joy with a
shrinking dread of aught that could vary it in any way. She saw at a glance,
Millicent sat down on a low seat by his side—her accustomed place, and the sightless eyes turned to her with an almost frightful anxiety, as though the frantic desire of the soul could enable it even yet to look through those darkened cavities. Meanwhile the grasp tightened on her hand; he spoke at last, his voice was low and tremulous.
“I have been so longing for you, my light, my joy!”
She started; he had never called her by such terms before:—he went on:
“I shall never call you Mary again, it is a false title; you have a dearer name for
“Listen, gentlest and tenderest of friends,” continued Aylmer. “I long to tell you all that
has been wandering through my heart this many a day, breathing, as it were, new life within
it. When you came to me,—a vision of sweetest mercy, I was plunged in a despair for which
earth has no parallel; my longing eyes were shut up from the light of day—deprived for ever of
their rapturous delight in beauty, and my pining soul was exiled from the light of life,
deprived for ever of its intense enjoyment in that love which is the moral beauty of this
world. When you came with that soft tender hand, that sweet voice, whose faintest tone
breathed volumes of affection, which it was unutterable
“Sweet angel, as this hope brightened in my heart, no words can ever tell the tide of matchless joy that gushed in with it; I felt, and I feel now, that almost would I gladly sacrifice the sight of these blind eyes again, to have so glorious, so unexampled a proof of that love which alone is precious to me on this earth.”
“So very sweet that hope, I could not bear to change it even for a more blessed
assurance—but I have lived in your presence, happy,—as in the days of light and joy—feeling
that hour by hour, with your
“But now I can no longer be content with but the hope, however firm, I must have the
certainty—that certainty which shall make the blind man’s darkened life, far brighter
She thought that her long sore trial was ended—that she who had been so tossed on the deep
waters of despair, so driven to and fro by storms of misery, so chilled to the very soul by
biting blasts of human cruelty, was about to enter on her rest at last—and that even she had
reason to rejoice in all that had occurred, since it had wrought for her a far more perfect
joy—for he who had coldly loved her formerly, already spoke of the intensity of tender‐
Aylmer was startled, almost terrified—he raised himself on his elbow, and it was sad to see the intense anxiety with which the force of habit sent the poor sightless eyes wandering in search of her.
“Where are you?” he said, with a mournful cry. “What can have happened? Why will you not
speak? Think, think how my
She shuddered violently—that fatal resemblance of voice, once before had cost her agony—but
now! Still she was silent, but for the convulsive drawing of her breath, which he heard
distinctly—the paleness of a deadly alarm spread over his face—he stretched out his shaking
hands, groping frantically in his great darkness. At last he touched her; then he seized her
by the arm; he dragged her close to him; he passed his hand over her head and face—“Speak,
speak!” he said, in a hoarse whisper.
Millicent never thought of the falsehood such a plan must involve. Those who worship their idols of flesh, soon forget the pure laws of a holier faith.
She thought only that she had consecrated herself to his happiness, and again
There was no time for delay; the clinging hands were tightening frantically upon her arm—the countenance of Aylmer was distorted with the most fearful emotions.
She bowed her head, her spirit resigned itself—it delivered up its hope and its joy as a man gives up life, and the breath on his lips. She accepted her penance.
She pressed her lips to his hands that were cruelly crushing her own, and whispered “I am her, indeed, who has loved you so well.”
How bitterly, long after, did she rue that perjury! but she thought not then of the crime, remembering only that she was to be the instrument of his peace, by what means soever that peace might be effected.
And he, the full tide of joy rushing back to his heart, assured that she was Juliet indeed,
how he tortured her soul with his
And he released her. He thought in truth such joy was bewildering. She crept away lost, hopeless, and in torture. Yet even then her thought was for him; she must take care that no other took from him the joy she had given—fearful the cost, and secure must the recompense be.
She went to Mrs. Hartley, she told her all—she besought her not to destroy the poor blind
man’s delusion. She said it was done,—it must be so,—that her task was appointed now to the
end of her days,—the, daily, hourly agony of receiving his love for another. She said that his
happiness was her own right, her charge, her care, and
Millicent thanked her for this permission to live a life of inconceivable anguish, as though for the highest boon; and Mrs. Hartley ever dreading to interfere in so dark and fearful a history, added in sorrowing accents,—“My child, I fear you have taken to yourself a torture you will find insupportable.”
AND Mrs. Hartley was right; there was a torture beyond the power of language to
express, in the life Millicent Grey had chosen to herself, yet not insupportable, nothing is
insupportable to that love which alone deserves the name, a love free from the least taint of
selfishness. Willingly she had accepted the sacrifice—willingly she performed it; but it was
not as formerly, one sharp fierce trial, one convulsive effort, and then the calm of inaction;
it was now the renewed and continued struggle of every
The very excess of her suffering was in some sense sweet, because all was endured for
Then, often, he would speak of Millicent herself, as of one whom he had never really loved, but sought only to marry for his uncle’s pleasure; and who, because of her indifference, or perhaps for the sake of Arthur Egerton, had been so ready to give him up: he said that her coldness of heart was plainly proved, since she had never so much as inquired after him since his fearful accident; how different from his beautiful, his beloved Juliet, whose unexampled devotion was lovely as her own sweet face,— whose pure generous soul shared the beauty of her outward appearance! how thankful he was that he had been saved from wedding Millicent Grey. He shuddered to think on the anguish he would have suffered had he seen Juliet Egerton, when already the husband of one he must have learnt to hate.
Poor Millicent wept very sore when he spoke thus, and if he felt her cold cheek
In the deceit she was now practicing, Millicent Grey had made that fatal mistake, that
subtle but most unrighteous error, which supposes that self‐sacrifice or a noble generous aim
can
But Millicent soon found, as must ever be
Gradually he made it manifest for what purpose he had sought this assurance; he said if it were so, if really he was to be so unspeakably blest as that she should never quit him more, she must take the sanction of his name, she must assume the title that once had been so nearly hers, and become his wife.
It may be imagined what terror there was in this proposal to the wretched Millicent; it was
utterly impossible to carry the deceit so far as to let him marry her under his present
delusion, and yet it was
Aylmer did not reproach her for her refusal, but she saw that he felt it deeply, and this cut her to the very heart.
Still, the days and weeks, and even months went on, whilst they continued to lead this painful and unnatural existence; but Millicent little thought the while how the very ground beneath her feet was being undermined.
It will not be supposed that Arthur
Knowing Stephen Aylmer to be thoroughly convinced that it was indeed Juliet, the only being he had ever really loved, who was giving him hourly proofs of such unequaled affection, Arthur felt certain that the disappointment, if ever he discovered his mistake, would be so terrible and so bitter, that the angry man would not scruple to cast off poor Millicent for ever.
Ungoverned passion is a fearful thing, and Arthur knew its power too well in his own soul,
not to judge accurately enough of
He found it by no means an easy matter to effect his purpose. Millicent had pre‐
One day, however, when some months had elapsed, in which the blind man had lived most happy in his sweet delusion, Arthur Egerton found means to penetrate into his appartment. Mrs. Hartly had gone out—and he had by a stratagem succeeded in having Millicent sent for to speak to some person on business in another part of the house.
Then he stole like a stealthy serpent into the blind man’s room.
For a moment Arthur Egerton stood appalled at the sight he saw—he remembered so well the
pride, and the beauty, and
He asked him if he recollected him, and inquired, with much apparent kindness, respecting the state of his health.
“Arthur Egerton, is it not?” exclaimed Aylmer. “I recognised your voice; I have been wishing much that some of Juliet’s family should visit us; I am very glad you are come.”
Arthur was delighted to hear him in his very sentence introduce the subject on which he wished to speak. It was necessary that he should give his information speedily, as Millicent was certain to return soon.
“I am truly happy to see you, my dear Aylmer,” he replied; “I fear, however, I can give you no news of Juliet which will be agreeable to you.”
“News of Juliet!” exclaimed Aylmer. “Arthur, what can you mean? how should I require news of her when she is with me every hour of the day?”
“Juliet with you?” replied Arthur, throwing into his voice a well‐feigned expression of surprise; “you must be labouring under some extraordinary mistake. My sister is not here, I can assure you.”
“That is, you are not aware of it; you are but just arrived, and it is plain she has concealed from you that she has been with us these many months; but it is best there should be no such mysteries. I will persuade her to see you, and tell you all the truth to‐day.”
“Aylmer,” said Arthur, with great decision and solemnity, “I know not what
He was careful not to tell she was married; it might have induced Aylmer more readily to forgive poor Millicent. An expression of the wildest agitation had passed over the face of the blind man; he started up, the darkened eyes staring wide open.
“In the name of mercy, what is it you say?” he exclaimed; “am I to doubt the evidence of my own senses? it is not half an hour since Juliet left the room—”
“Aylmer, I grieve to remind you of it; but you must remember that you are deprived of the
use of that sense which could alone enable you to ascertain the truth on
“But I know her voice—the touch of her hand, Arthur; I tell you she has been at my side for hours, and answered even to that name.”
“There is often a strange resemblance in voices, and where there is the premeditated resolution to mislead one blind as you are, it is not a difficult matter; but it is needless for you to argue the point any further with me. I tell you I have been here for months, and constantly in this house, only they would not let me see you, lest I should act a friend’s part by you, and undeceive you. I have watched the person who represents Juliet for you; I know who she is, for I have seen her face day by day, though you could not.”
There was an evident truthfulness in this
All that had been deepest joy to him, in the delusion thus rudely destroyed, all that was
horror, darkness, and despair in the prospect of his life without it, had gathered
“Who is she then, where is she, who has dared to deceive me, that base, most treach‐
“She is here to speak for herself,” muttered Arthur, shaking from head to foot, as he suddenly perceived that Millicent had entered unperceived, and was standing close to the blind man, with her horror‐dilated eyes fixed full on his face. She had heard Aylmer’s terrible speech.
“Here!” he exclaimed, and stretched out his hand; it fell on the shoulder of Millicent, and
closed on it with a grasp fierce and cruel as that of a tiger. He dragged her to him with such
violence that she fell to the ground; then he shouted in her ear with a voice more awful to
her than the thunders in their wrath, “Who are you—what are you—impostor, deceiver—that have
dared to betray the blind man? Vile hypocrite, creeping here with your soft
“Forgive, forgive,” gasped Millicent, in convulsions of anguish and fear.
“Forgive! is there ever forgiveness for a deed like this? I will know who you are, most wretched impostor; speak at once—lest in my fury I take from you the power of speaking for ever—who are you?”
“Millicent!” She felt as if her heart’s blood gushed out with that name.
“Millicent!” It seemed as though a lingering of hope had remained for him till that word was spoken; and now all was blackness in the spirit, where hope and joy reigned so brightly before.
With all the force of his strong hand he flung her away, as a thing too worthless to
That look was with him to his dying day; and years after, when he was sinking in his
WHEN Mrs. Hartley returned she found only Stephen Aylmer within the house, in a
state of mind which baffled all description. She guessed what happened, but he told her all in
detail; and his fury returning as he thought how bright had been the dream, how bitter the
waking, he repeated the cruel words he had used to the wretched Millicent.
Mrs. Hartley could scarcely contain her indignation, when she heard how he had treated that
generous faithful friend. Poor
With a tone of solemnity which forcibly arrested his attention, she told him to compose himself, and listen to the truth of his own life, which had been since the hour he met Juliet Egerton presented to him in such false colours, that he had fallen into those grievous errors, whereby he had utterly destroyed his own peace and that of others.
Mrs. Hartley knew Juliet’s real character most thoroughly,—one of her own married daughters
had known both her, and the Marchesa with whom she had lived at Milan very intimately, and had
detailed to her
And now Mrs. Hartley began from the very commencement, and detailed all this to
She described what that toil had been, racking her soul as the limbs of the poor slave are racked at his work, and how up to this hour in desolation and faintness, poor Millicent wrought still, to accomplish this end.
She explained the history of their parting, telling how Millicent had seen his own letter, and straightway for the accomplishment of his peace on earth, (that deep desire of her spirit) consented to slay her own hopes and give herself up to the worst desolation.
She spoke of her that evening at Milton Lodge, when Aylmer in his delirium of joy and Juliet
in her insolent triumph, thought nothing of her, who had bought it all for them by the
death‐like anguish she then was enduring. Mrs. Hartley passed on to the time of his accident;
she detailed Juliet’s conduct so revolting and heartless; and she saw that he writhed under
her words,
As this intelligence rang on his ear, Aylmer felt as though the lightning bad struck him
again—but this blow was
Mrs. Hartley spoke now of Millicent, of her patient agony in the solitude of her home at
Aix. It was soothing to Aylmer as a sweet strain of music, to hear of such love, when his
breast was convulsed with the knowledge of Juliet’s defection; it was touching to hear the
scene of Millicent’s arrival at the châlet, to know with what a beautiful love and respect she
knelt down to kiss the feet of the blind man in his helplessness. Aylmer knew more truly than
Mrs. Hartley could tell, how tenderly Millicent had cared for him since then, and how the days
and the hours had past when she lived but to minister to him; then she bid him recall all he
said, when he told her he believed she was Juliet, which Millicent never suspected, and how
not only it seemed that the happiness she laboured to gain him
Poor Millicent was but a woman, weak, timid, and trusting; she believed he would die, or she
believed if he did live, it would be to great misery—there seemed no other means of preserving
his peace, or gaining his happiness but by this continued delusion; she thought only of the
bitterness of the trial to herself, and not of the error—and precisely because it
“And now, Stephen,” said Mrs. Hartley, as she concluded, “you know and understand what has been and is, that love in its most generous tenderness, which this day you have punished so heavily.”
Aylmer was deeply moved, but almost too much bewildered, with mingled sorrow and remorse to
speak or to think. Mrs. Hartley left him; she was anxious to find the unhappy Millicent, for
she almost believed from his manner she might speak words of hope to her—but she sought her in
vain, she was not in the house, and no one hew where she was. One of the servants had seen her
creeping out of the châlet, when her ghastly appearance had terrified the woman, who had
already been alarmed at the sounds of vehement passion which had burst from Aylmer’s room; she
had watched Millicent wandering away, with feeble and uncertain steps into the woods, and then
she had seen her no more. Mrs. Hartley became exces‐
He was startled beyond measure when he heard she had not returned; he himself had not seen her since she quitted the house; but full of terror now at thought of all that might occur, if with his own hand he had driven her desperate, he rushed down into the woods to seek her.
Mrs. Hartley returned in extreme agitation, and along with the servants sought
Mrs. Hartley sent for a party of peasants, who were to search the woods and drag the rivers till morning; whilst she waited their arrival, she went for a few minutes to Aylmer, who had sent for her repeatedly.
“What is all this?” he said to her, in a voice full of agitation, “where is Millicent?”
“Who can tell,” said Mrs. Hartley, the tears streaming from her eyes as she spoke; “perhaps she is resting now, as living she never has rested! My poor child, my poor gentle child—it has been a cruel world to her!”
Aylmer shivered in every limb, and the cold dew stood on his forehead.
“In the name of mercy,” he said, “you do not mean—” his lips refused to articulate further.
“I do not know,” replied Mrs. Hartley, “none can know anything as yet, but my heart misgives me—death, natural or by the violence of insanity, seems the only termination one can imagine to such anguish as hers must have been.” She made no attempt to spare the feelings of Aylmer in speaking thus, though she saw he was suffering torments; his conduct aggravated in her eyes, by the fatal result she dreaded, had seemed to her so heartless and cruel, that she could scarce believe him capable of much feeling now, or overcome the indignation she felt.
Mrs. Hartley was wrong, however, in thinking Aylmer heartless or naturally cruel; he was a
man of passionate temper, and the violent disappointment he experienced, had goaded him into a
passing
It was a most awful night he passed. All that Millicent had done for him, all her precious
unexampled love, rose up before him with an agonizing truthfulness of detail. Never, never
again in this world—he felt it deeply—would he find one to love him as she had done! and after
all, the being he had so fondly cherished for these last six months, because of her tender
care, her matchless devotion to himself,—the being to whom his desolate heart had clung, as
never to Juliet in the time of his triumphant happiness, was Millicent in very truth, and not
Whoever, whatever she might be that, angel‐like, had tended him with such a loving mercy,
she was still the friend, who by her disinterested tenderness had drawn his very soul towards
her in grateful, true affection; he had felt by a natural, though mistaken fancy, when he
found that as Juliet, she did not exist for him, as though he must lose her altogether,—and
that the happiness he had derived from her society under that name, must utterly pass away,
when he was told she had no claim to it. He saw now what utter folly his was: the indi‐
It is certain that Stephen Aylmer would not so soon have experienced this revulsion of feeling, had he not been made aware of Juliet’s real character which to him, with his great refinement of mind, was most revolting in its peculiar qualities; and likewise a most powerful effect had been produced upon him by Mrs. Hartley’s evident conviction, that his harshness had most literally broken the heart of the unhappy being, who had sacrificed to him her all of life, and died at last as it were at his command.
Stern indeed must be the man who could hear unmoved, that the heart which loved
It seemed to him so piteous a thing, to think of this poor stricken creature, loaded
Morning came at length, and with it Mrs. Hartley, merely to tell him in a voice choked with
sobs, that no tidings of poor Millicent had been obtained. Aylmer could not speak, his
self‐abhorrence was so intense—he started up to seek her, and die with her if need be’, then
remembering the blindness, the helplessness that chained him to his couch, he fell back in an
agony of most impotent sorrow. Mrs. Hartley, who was utterly exhausted and now almost
despairing, sat down for a few minutes to think what further efforts should be made, however
hopeless she feared them to be—and there was a complete silence in the
It was during this stillness, that both of them suddenly heard the measured tramp as of many
feet, coming along the path which led past the windows to the house. Mrs. Hartley perceived at
the same time, and in an under tone communicated to Stephen, that a party of peasants,
carrying a sort of
Intense agitation rendered them both motionless. She endeavoured to rise, that she might go
to meet them, but all power had deserted her aged limbs, and she could only wait listening to
the ominous sounds without. Aylmer’s condition was fearful, blind and palsied in such a
moment, it was as though he were chained down with bands of iron. The peasants, finding no one
in the outer rooms, came on with their burden to that of Aylmer; the door opened,—slowly the
tramping footsteps
“Is she dead?” sobbed Mrs. Hartley, falling on her knees beside the litter, and hiding her face on Millicent’s arm, that she might not look on so piteous a spectacle.
“Not dead, we hope, as yet,” said one of the peasants, “her pulse fluttered a little when we raised her, but she is altogether senseless.”
“We found her lying just as you see here, under one of the forest trees,” said another, “and
we think she must have lain thus motionless all night, for the leaves which the wind has swept
down since last evening, had gathered in a heap on her head
Mrs. Hartley took courage then to look upon her, as these words seemed to give some hope,
and gently lifted the wet hair from the sweet face she had so loved to gaze upon. Millicent
was like a marble statue, colourless and rigid,—no breath on the white lips, not a shiver in
the blue‐veined eyelids, sternly closed. Mrs. Hartley saw that she was in a death‐like trance,
from which it was doubtful if ever she would awake. She understood it all. Stricken at heart,
sinking under the load of his bitter reproach, she had gone staggering out; and as, darker and
darker, rose the thought of his hate upon her soul, and the memory of the intense love with
which he had uttered Juliet’s name, the life had seemed to ebb back from her breast,—for there
is a limit to human suffering, there is a point at which the frail powers within us can endure
no more,—and then her
She had fallen down senseless, motionless, among the stones and thorns, beneath the rocking branches of the forest trees,—and there, the livelong night, that desolate child had lain. The dews of heaven had wet her pallid face, the mountain winds had beat around her helpless form,—the thorns had pierced her,—the night air had chilled her to the heart, but she neither felt nor heeded nature’s persecution; for colder, keener than the mountain air, more dread than the mountain blast, sharper than the merciless thorns, and poisonous as ever midnight dew, was the one deadly thought that struck her down, perhaps to perish there—the thought of his revealed hate.
The peasants’ task was now complete; with many a look of lingering pity on that
When she returned she found that Aylmer, who had listened in silent agitation to all that
passed, had groped his way to the spot where Millicent lay, and had fallen on his knees beside
her. He had raised her head, and wound his arms round her; he was calling her now by every
most endearing term, breathing on the cold lips, that his warm breath might
She seemed utterly bewildered, her senses had evidently not returned fully, only she was conscious on what arm she lay, and a sense of unutterable sweetness of repose passed through her soul. She nestled closer to him, and her eyes closed again, as if thus to die, were rapture beyond all words, and the yet feeble life seemed almost to forsake her, for she fainted again.
But now the swoon was only temporary, his voice had fully restored her to existence, and Mrs. Hartley carried her away to administer the care which at last was very necessary.
A serious illness was the consequence of Millicent’s exposure to the night air, and during its duration, Aylmer seemed to live for her alone; when he was not allowed to be with her, he lay at the threshold of her door, and there could be no doubt that her recovery was greatly facilitated, by the consciousness that his love had at last come forth abundantly to answer hers.
Yet when, after she was fully restored to health, he pleaded with her, that now, at length, after such storms and weary conflicts, they might both pass into a haven of rest in their mutual affection; when he besought her to become his wife, and terminate for ever the desolation in which both had suffered much, it was Millicent who shrunk from a union, and hesitated to give the promise he so longed for.
Not that she feared him, or that her deathless affection was diminished one iota, but that
at last the natural dignity of the
Mrs. Hartley and Aylmer long combated the idea vainly; It was in truth most utterly false;
Aylmer valued and loved her now as she deserved, and esteemed the
IT would have been hard to have found in the wide world two happier beings than
Millicent Grey and Stephen Aylmer, when at last,—her hand tight clasped in his, they sat
together, day by day, and spoke of the long life of joy, which was so shortly to commence for
them, in each other’s society.
Millicent believed she had found the spirit’s rest at last, the satisfaction, complete and full, of the mysterious longing of her whole being.
She still was convinced that none could
If anything even for a moment disturbed her perfect happiness, it was the frequent apparition at the window of the room in which they usually sat, of a haggard, fearful face—that with the tangled hair hanging over a brow dark with despair, and a look of indescribable anguish in the wild, sorrow haunted eyes, cast in upon them a glance of utter wretchedness, that might have touched the coldest spirit.
But happiness is a selfish thing; in sadness mostly we have compassion on the kindred suffering, and we cannot bear to see the tears of others, when our own are falling, because we know their bitterness. In the time of her own great desolation, Millicent had mourned for Arthur Egerton; but now in her absorbing joy, it is doubtful if ever she remembered what he must be suffering, except when that face of agony passed like a frightful vision before her eyes.
This indifference on her part served but to exasperate the unhappy man. He knew all that had
passed; he saw them, day after day, before him, for he was drawn to that sight which pierced
his very soul, by some irresistible attraction. He saw them in their perfect happiness, and
truly all hope for him seemed utterly destroyed; nor was he otherwise than inconceivably
wretched, but still, not yet had there passed from his soul the strange, mysterious
conviction, which
“And do you really mean you are going to leave me one whole hour?” said Aylmer fondly, as Millicent sat by him on a bright summer morning.
“I really am; but I shall go so quickly, and return so soon, you scarce will miss me.”
“Not miss you! even for a single instant, darling? You would miss the light if it were taken from you but one moment, and so you are my light, and I cannot bear that you should go from me, any more than you could bear an utter darkness.”
It made her heart beat thick and faint with joy to hear such words.
“Indeed, it is bitter to me to go even for one little hour, but I must do it, it would not be right to neglect the poor creature who is waiting for me.”
“I do not see why you should be kind to any one but me,” said Aylmer, playfully. “You are mine, my own most treasured possession, and I will have it, that it is your highest duty to stay with me.”
“And so it is my high and happy duty,” said Millicent. “Do you know, I do not think, that above three times in my life, it could be my duty to leave you; and so this is the first time, and I hope the other two will not occur for twenty years to come.”
“Could you not put this one off for ten, or even five?—five years hence I will let you leave me two whole hours instead of one; come, is it a bargain?”
“But you forget, that if I agreed to that,
“You shall go,” said Aylmer, touched by these words; “and which road do you take?”
“The path by the cliff, where we walk every day.”
“I know that road so well, I am sure I could find my way alone, so if you do not return in an hour, I shall certainly come to meet you.”
“Oh, do not attempt that!” exclaimed Millicent, anxiously; “there is a part of the road which is extremely dangerous; it leads along the very edge of the precipice.”
“Ah, that is where I feel your hand clasp mine so tightly, and you guide me with such care. I am sure that pleasant recollection will make me know the spot, and then I can walk cautiously.”
“No, dearest Stephen, pray do not try it alone; indeed, I should be in terror if I thought you would; a false turn just there would be destruction. Promise me you will not go.”
“Indeed, I shall promise nothing of the kind,” said Aylmer, laughing, “for if you are afraid, it will make you come back to me all the sooner.”
“That it will, most certainly,” said Millicent. She kissed his hand as she spoke, in token of farewell, and so they parted.
On that path, their accustomed walk, where day by day, Arthur Egerton waited and watched for
hours, that he might look on
And his patient, miserable watching was soon rewarded; he saw her approaching earlier to‐day than usual, and alone. She came springing up the mountain path, with the dancing step that told what a light, joyous heart she carried,—glad and bright was her face as the morning itself,—sparkling in her eyes was the sunshine of hope, as the beams that lay fair on the rugged hills,—wild and gay as the song of the woodland bird, her sweet voice carolled in the clear, blue air,—a very vision of gladness and joy she seemed, bright in her youth and happiness, as when first he saw her in the old halls at Rookcliffe, and felt that his soul was hers with a surpassing love.
Surely the worm that crawls the earth, is not so abject as man, in the egotism of absorbing
passion? She was his fellow creature, inheritor with himself of the common death, condemned,
like him, to a life
Onward she came, with the sweet voice singing, and back he shrank from her bright approach
as the serpent from the light of day; he cowered among the bushes unseen, till the light form
went by, and then the parting branches showed the dark, haggard face gazing after her with
baneful glance. She had paused on the dangerous spot of which she had spoken to Aylmer, where
the path edged off from the precipice and took an abrupt turn to the abyss, and her thoughts
flew swiftly to him who lay
Long hours he lay there, for despair has no time or space, and his soul was stretched on the rack of thought.
At length, on that mountain path, another step came sounding near, toiling up, slow, heavy, and feeble, where she had past with her bounding feet,—wearily straining his new‐found strength, the blind man came, cautiously trying his uncertain powers.
Arthur Egerton shrunk not from him, as he had shrunk from the sweet face Millicent,—a sudden impulse constrained him to rise, to stand forth and confront this blinded cripple, who had stolen his light of life from him.
Aylmer heard the sound of the moving feet, and guiding his steps by the stick on which he leant, drew near.
“Who is there?” he said.
“Arthur Egerton!”
“Ah, is it you? I am glad I have met you. Did you see my Millicent pass this way?”
“I saw Millicent Grey go past.”
“Then I shall meet her returning soon.”
“Then I shall see you come back together.”
“Yes, together!—as we shall soon be for life; but tell me, am I taking the right direction? The path turns here to escape the precipice, it leads this way, does it not?”
He advanced a few steps, and paused for an answer.
A bitter laugh rose to the lips of Arthur; the blind man was within one yard of the
precipice—he had missed the turning, and one step more would carry him over an
“Tell me, am I not right?”
The blood rushed to his head, his temples throbbed furiously, every pulse in his body beat
madly—the hands were convul‐
“Yes!” not
Whirling down through the deep blue air, caught for a moment by the jagged
For Stephen Aylmer this world was nought—for Stephen Aylmer this life was done. The trial was over, the doom was sealed—the soul was gone, to the Far Unseen.
And gay on the mountain air, was the sound of the sweet voice singing, as down through the pine‐wood she sped to that path, and thought on the arms that would open to greet her.
At the sound of the sweet voice singing, he fled.—Heaven save us from that man’s agony! The demon went with him who had uttered the word, the taunting, laughing, exulting demon! And another went with him,—a spectre, the great gaunt spectre Remorse, who twined her hideous arms around him and clasped him close to her breast as a loving bride—for now she was his wedded companion for life.
Then through the chaos of horror that raged in his breast, certain words,—certain words
heard in childhood, came with a deepening agony, and seemed to inscribe themselves in letters
of burning fire on his soul—they were these:—
And it was as though he heard echoing loud on his ear, how the deep rolling voice of
the people answered and said,
AND it befell Arthur Egerton, as many a condemned man on the scaffold might attest
it befalls most criminals,—he who had lived all his life in practical, if not in intellectual,
unbelief, now that the consciousness of a deadly crime was on his soul, became possessed of a
full, perfect, and for him, most appalling faith, in the revelation of a future judgment and
an eternal punishment. Deep penitence came in like a flood upon his soul—penitence not only
for the crime, but for
One thought, one wish, one dream was present with him night and day. To be forgiven, by years of a life of penance; to show repentance, and to be forgiven; but he felt that he dared not ask, nor pray, nor so much as breathe the faintest desire for the pardon of heaven, till he had obtained that of her, whom on earth he had so deeply, fatally injured.
He knew nothing of her, excepting only that she had not died, when the link that bound her to earth had been so rudely snapped asunder; he knew not how it had fared with her, since she took her last look of the mangled form, she would have cherished with her heart’s life.
He knew that the lifeless body of Stephen Aylmer had been found, and carried home the same
day that he met his cruel death, and that shortly after it had been conveyed
Yet henceforward, for him, all existence was gathered up into two great works, which living he must accomplish:—first, to obtain mercy and pardon from her—and then to seek the mercy and pardon of heaven.
So, night and day, he wandered round the châlet, wearing the rocks with kneeling close to it, for hours together, still ever hoping—hoping—he might but see her come, where he could lay himself at her feet, and bid her trample on him, if she would. And months passed on, but he had patience, for he lived but in this thought; and so at last, the longing, wasting desire, was accomplished.
It was a fair summer morning, glorious and bright, just such a day, as that on which
The murderer, with the spectre Remorse, to whom he was wedded, at his side, knelt on the rock, whence he could see her dwelling;—when it was given him to look upon her once again. Across that threshold, with a calm, gliding step, there passed what seemed to him more like a spirit than a human being—so wan, so wasted. Surely death had passed already on that bloodless cheek, that pure, transparent forehead.
Surely no inhabitant of earth ever looked to heaven with eyes so spiritual, so holy,
glittering with pure light, like the stars in the sky. What a stormless serenity on that face,
pallid and delicate as monumental marble! What an imploring expression of meekness in the
white, half‐parted lips! What a depth of utter submission in the folding of those pale hands
on the still fair
Rocking to and fro with every breath of wind, while gently waved the white robes around her, the tranquil figure glided on: in the golden sunshine, in the warm, glowing hues of day, she looked like a pale sheeted ghost, flitting back with its noiseless step to the rest of its own quiet grave.
And to a grave she went,—in one sense her own, for her heart lay buried there. They had made
the couch of his deep repose beneath a tall pine‐tree, a sweet, fair spot, for the long grass
waved there and the flowers were growing, and none need have dreamt of the worms beneath;
Creeping on to her, cowering earthwards, like a dark, blighting shadow, came the penitent man; nearer and nearer he stole, trembling and gasping, fearing almost he should see her pass away like a vision, too fair and too angel‐like for this cold cruel world.
But still she remained, so calm and so motionless: the fair lids drooped not over the deep,
longing gaze, and her quiet breath stirred not the soft summer air. Then he
He told her all,—all his terrible tale, and confessed that from him had the word gone forth, which consigned the being she had loved so well to his death of anguish, and herself to despair. He writhed on the ground as he spoke, for it seemed to him superhuman that she should think of forgiveness now,—yet he asked it, as the frantic man, dying of thirst, asks the draught of pure water that alone can save him. He had not looked on her face, so he knew not how she had borne these tidings, and her sweet voice had breathed no sound while he spoke; but when he asked for pardon her answer came slowly. She rose from her knees and stood upright, softly she laid the fair, transparent hand on the dust‐soiled head of the penitent man,—clear and sweet as the loveliest music, her voice breathed out on the summer air:—
“I forgive you deeply and fully, as I pray that I may be forgiven.”
The hands rested there a moment as if with a silent blessing, then, like the white wings of a dove, from his head were lifted and folded meekly across her own calm breast.
She resumed her place on the quiet grave, and he felt as though waters most pure and
refreshing had passed on his guilty soul; but he dared not linger near her, lest a feeling of
joy should steal into his heart. No right had he to know aught on this earth save that one
word
“Are you, indeed, at rest?” and she answered,
“I rest, as I never rested on earth before:—hear me, and learn life’s truth from my lips,—if
sorrow hath not taught you already. I thought that the soul’s repose was in human love, and
thus far I was right, that in Love
The low voice died away on his ear like the sigh of the summer wind when night closes in. He heard the light feet echo past, and the waving of her garments as she glided away, but he dared not look up, he was spell‐bound there.
So never more did he look on her face, or hear her sweet voice again.
Arthur Egerton went out from the shores of Europe, to the burning regions of tropical
The life of their benefactors among them was full of torment, and danger, and toil; but none so toiled in torture and pain, as the remorseful man that went with them. He willed to be the slave of all,—he chose the heaviest burdens,—the hardest task; no complaint passed his lips, no rest did he seek:—to a practical repentance he vowed his life, and well hath he kept that vow.
* * * *
Long years had past, when in the twilight sky, one summer’s evening, a sunbeam lingered. It
was the last sweet smile of the
That house was known to all who suffered near,—refuge for the orphan,—home for the penitent,—dwelling for the blind, the infirm, and aged; no sorrow that touches the human heart, could fail to find sympathy there.
And the sunbeam entered the quiet room, for here must its work be done,—and it settled in glory on the pure pale brow of one who lay there most placid and calm.
That beam might have travelled the wide world over, and failed to meet a sight more holy and bright, than that which it lit with its glory now.
For the countenance where it shone in its golden light, wore that aspect of loveliness most serene, which never on earth can be found, save only on the face of the holy dead.
Oh the unutterable beauty of gentle sleep, with which the white lids rested on the whiter cheek! oh, smile of ineffable joy that lingered on the pale sweet mouth! How the aching heart, throbbing so thick and fast, faints with desire to know that rest!
Fit mission for the last bright sunbeam, to lend its radiance to that fair corpse, for the night shall be short for both, and a glorious morning shall wake for them.
Those who had known her past history, had placed in her dead hands the types of