THE INHERITANCE OF EVIL; OR, THE CONSEQUENCES OF MARRYING A DECEASED WIFE’S SISTER.
LONDON: JOSEPH MASTERS, ALDERSGATE STREET, AND 78, NEW BOND STREET.
1849.
THROUGH the mist and gloom of a dull November morning, a pompous funeral procession went its way along the busy streets of London.
It was a common sight—so common that it attracted no attention from the multitude
who crowded on its path, as with eager care‐worn faces they hurried on in their
several avocations; and yet it was a strange sight too for them if they would
but have thought upon it—the passing amongst them of that quiet traveller to the
realms unseen! For so surely as he was even now moving on to the portals of the
land which is very far off, they themselves, with
We say unconsciously, for each one had set before himself some desirable object
of attainment for which he toiled that day—wealth, fame, ambition, love—some
bright vision, to realize which he gave up unreservedly the redeemless hours of
his existence, whilst, with every breath he drew in labouring for it, he
shortened the life for which it was to be attained. Yet even as
Mr. Maynard had been a wealthy city merchant; in early youth he had been thrown
on his own resources, penniless, and well nigh friendless. He was a man resolute
of will, and of good abilities; but his mind, having never been directed to the
Unseen Truths, had fixed itself entirely on the fleeting realities of this
life.
From that time his life was given up to this object only. He toiled, he slaved,
he speculated; he rose up early, and late took rest; he ate the bread of
carefulness; he wasted lavishly his health and strength and intellect; he
devoured widows’ houses, and made the orphan desolate: for as his desire
strengthened till he grew to be its very slave, he cared little for the injury
done to others in its accomplishment—and he succeeded. Man has a mighty power in
working out a resolute purpose, be it for good or evil, if his whole soul is
concentrated upon it. Mr. Maynard became rich, beyond what he had ever hoped for
when he set out on his pilgrimage to the shrine of his god, Mammon; but still he
laboured on, plunging into speculation, for to make money was the aim and end of
his existence, and he could not stop now. Some dim vision may have been before
him of a luxurious retirement hereafter, where he should dwell, surrounded by
all the splendour and comfort wealth could procure him; but his health failed
him meantime, sacrificed to his laborious and unremitting industry. Death came
and took him when his soul was so wrapped up in the
Mr. Maynard left two daughters. He had married somewhat late in life, for the sole purpose of connecting himself with the father of his bride, the head of a great mercantile house. It was his desire to succeed to this man’s position at his death, and this wish was fulfilled.
A very few years had passed away, and his wife died. Neglected, though uncomplaining, she perished for want of sympathy and affection, as flowers fade when deprived of air and sunshine. Her little daughters were given up to the care of nurses and governesses, and Mr. Maynard required, not unfrequently, to be reminded of their existence.
If he remembered them at all in his dying hour, so appalling in its suddenness, it must have been with a pang of remorse, for he had made no provision for them—not from wilful neglect, but simply because he never thought of death at all; it was a contingency which did not enter into his speculations.
He left no will, and the management of his affairs naturally devolved on his partner, Mr. Hardman. By some process of calculation peculiar to himself, this gentleman discovered that all which remained of Mr. Maynard’s capital must now become merged in that of the house. His speculations had in fact ruined him, and the rich man’s orphan children did not inherit from him so much as the cost of that same stately tombstone which Mr. Hardman deemed it his duty to erect over his grave.
Some little property Elizabeth and Agnes Maynard had received at their mother’s death, and this circumstance had induced Mr. Hardman voluntarily to constitute himself their guardian. To do him justice, he was certainly in some degree influenced in his decision by the glimmerings of better feeling, which shone through this worldly man’s profound and inherent selfishness when he thought of the desolate condition of his partner’s daughters.
They sat together now in the darkened room
Mr. Maynard had certainly done as little to awaken affection or inspire regret as most men, and yet the sobs of his orphan children came thick and fast, as they heard the tramp of the horses which bare him away.
But there are two kinds of sorrow with which the dead are mourned, and Mr.
Maynard could lay claim to one of them only; there is the natural instinct, the
mysterious claim of the ties of blood, which sends a bitter pang through the
heart when they are rent asunder, added to that strange pity which we never fail
to experience for the powerless corpse stretched out so pale and cold before us,
although we know well that ourselves shall soon be laid as cold and pale, and
haply the thought is sweet
No such lofty and holy affection as this had bound the soul of the stern worldly‐minded man to his young daughters; and perhaps we might rightly enough estimate the nature of the welcome which the departed shall receive from the brotherhood of saints above, by the character of the sorrow with which they are lamented here.
Had Elizabeth and Agnes Maynard analyzed their feelings in this the saddest hour of their lives, they would have found that they mourned far less for their father, to whom they were almost strangers, than for that bitter sense of desolation against which the warm, loving heart of youth rebels so strongly.
They nestled close together; Agnes, who was scarce sixteen, and five years
younger than her sister, clung to her with a sort of
She was singularly sweet‐tempered and guileless, but altogether deficient in moral courage and strength of mind; as she advanced out of childhood, she seemed only to lean the more hopelessly on the guidance of others, instead of exerting the powers of her own mind; and the prevailing feature of her character was a clinging and passionate tenderness of disposition, over which she neither had, nor attempted to have, any control whatever. Elizabeth had far more depth of character, with an intensity and sensitiveness of feeling which would scarce have been looked for under her outward reserve of manner. Her affection for those she loved was of a nature so profound and exacting, that it had engendered that jealousy of disposition which makes such havoc of the soul that harbours it. As yet this fatal propensity had been little called forth, for her whole thoughts were centred on Agnes, and the sisters had now no other home but in their mutual love.
There was one circumstance in the life of Elizabeth Maynard which was destined to
influence her whole existence, and the recollection of it was busy at her heart
even now, as she sat with her fair young sister sobbing in her
There is something very awful in the death‐bed of one who dies of a broken heart. Death by the judgment of Heaven is a holy, though terrible thing; but the heart revolts from the sight, when His inscrutable decree permits a human hand to sap the springs of a fellow‐creature’s life by wanton or careless cruelty.
Elizabeth still shuddered when she thought of that white drawn face, so young, but rowed with unavailing tears, and the pale lips from which no murmur ever passed, now wreathing themselves into a strange smile of joy at her release. Close to her breast, whence the breath came faint and gasping, the mother had drawn her youngest born, as though she thought the warmth of that little healthy frame could have driven back the chill that was curdling round her heart.
Mr. Maynard was not there, for the dying woman, true and tender even yet to the husband she had loved so vainly, would not let his slumbers be disturbed, though her heart yearned to tell him how she forgave him all, and loved him to the last.
When she saw Elizabeth by her side, she raised herself up and looked at her with eyes gleaming, even through the shades of death, with an expression of intense entreaty. One care—one thought of earth still chained back that fluttering spirit yearning to depart—it was for the little child who lay in her bosom. With the quick instinct of a mother, she had perceived that the little Agnes would possess to the uttermost that warm and loving disposition which had made of herself so wretched a wife. Another might have cared little for the cold neglect which had destroyed her; and when she thought of all the storms and dangers on that wide sea of life where she had made so sad a shipwreck, she trembled with an agonizing fear for the rosy happy child who slept upon her bed of death.
She had no hope but in her eldest daughter; for she knew that she left her children friendless—not even their father could be called their friend! For Elizabeth herself she feared nothing; the child was strangely reserved even then, and her mother never dreamt of the strong tide of feeling which lurked under that calm exterior, though she could duly appreciate the superiority of intellect and force of character, which were already so manifest.
Addressing herself far less to the child then
Elizabeth had, as we have said, a mind beyond her years; and she knew well that it was no light promise which she gave in that hour, and sealed in the farewell kiss, with which she drained her mother’s last breath upon her lips. She thought of it now in the time of their common desolation, as she looked on poor Agnes in her helpless sorrow, and lifted up the veil of sunny hair that she might gaze into her sweet innocent face. Deeply she resolved that, whatever might be their fate, her work and office must ever be to guard that little one close by her side, and shield her from all sorrow and danger.
To both these sisters, earth and the things of it were as yet all in all. Their
governess had given them what she termed a “religious education,”
The sisters were still seated together in silence, when the door opened, and Mr. Hardman entered with the slow solemn step suitable to this mournful occasion.
He had come to acquaint his wards with his intentions respecting them, immediately on returning from the funeral of their father, this being the proper and legitimate moment for such a communication.
Mr. Hardman was systematic in everything: systematic in selfishness, in
covetousness, and in the virtues which he deemed necessary to his
respectability. He had as keen a relish for money‐making as his partner, Mr.
Maynard,
Slowly and surely he advanced in a solid prosperity; gradually he surrounded himself with all that his soul coveted—luxury, comfort, ostentatious splendour for himself, his wife, and his family; and then he set himself systematically to enjoy them according to his previous calculations.
He was now a man of weight and influence in the city, but he continued to pursue,
with rigid firmness, the system to which he owed so much of his advancement,
namely, the inflexible determination with which, even in the most unimportant
matters, he carried out his own plans and ideas in spite of all
Mr. Hardman proceeded to inform his wards of the arrangement which he and his wife had adopted for them after mature consideration.
Elizabeth was to take up her residence in his house, and become, for some time at least, a member of his family. Agnes was to accompany one of his own daughters to a fashionable school in Paris, there to complete her education. With a cry almost of despair, both sisters vehemently deprecated the idea of their separation; there were but two of them all alone in the wide world, surely he would not part them?
Mr. Hardman was immovable, and they were too helpless to resist. He had already two daughters older than Elizabeth, and his wife was resolutely determined not to have the charge of more than three.
Mr. Hardman continued to acquaint them with the details of his plan as firmly and composedly as though they had gladly acquiesced in it. His carriage was to come for them that evening, to conduct them both to his house—the following week Agnes was to go to Paris. He mentioned the sums he would deduct yearly from their little fortunes as payment to himself for their expenses; recommended them to prepare for the removal of their effects from the house they were to enter no more, and so took his leave.
The door had no sooner closed upon him than Agnes gave way to a burst of the most
passionate sorrow, whilst Elizabeth, whose feelings
After a little time, however, she tenderly raised her sister’s drooping head, and said, with an effort at calmness—
“It is of no use to struggle, dear Agnes; we must submit—we have no home!”
“No home?” echoed Agnes. “Oh, shall we never have a home again? shall we never find a spot where we may dwell together again, and no one shall have power to divide us?”
“We know not what may be in reserve for us,” said Elizabeth, sadly; “but most certainly they shall not separate us long: the time must come when we shall be free from Mr. Hardman’s tutelage, and then I will defy the whole world to rob me of the charge which I received from our mother on her death‐bed.”
“Ah! but that will not be for a long time,” said Agnes, sighing heavily. Then
suddenly, with all the buoyancy of youth, her expression changed from one of
deep despondency to a hopeful joy. “I will tell you how it must be,” she
exclaimed; “you must marry very soon, and then we shall have a home together
once again: you would take me to live with you
“I would, indeed,” replied Elizabeth, with a faint smile at the rapidity with which Agnes’s ideas rose. “If ever I have a home, it shall in truth be yours also; and you may rest assured that I will never accept of any unless you are to share it with me.”
WITHIN a week from the funeral of Mr. Maynard, Mr. Hardman’s plans with respect to his orphan daughters had been put into full effect. Agnes was established at a school in Paris, there to have the natural tenderness of her disposition fostered into a weak and pernicious sensibility, and the romance with which her character was already too much tinctured converted into a false sentimentality, in which she learned to believe it was meritorious to indulge. She was taught to imagine that self‐command showed a want of feeling—that self‐discipline and self‐denial were possible only to those who were cold of heart and stern in character. Life was presented before her in an unreal colouring, which a bitter experience was alone to disperse hereafter; and her young unformed mind soon became imbued with that dangerous sophistry which so much pervades the tone of society in France.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth was profoundly un‐
One great duty she had placed before herself, the duty of respectability and prosperity, and this she performed with unremitting and unflinching exactitude. Of the gentle charities of home, she knew nothing; the loving sympathy—the tender care—the anxious watchfulness over the comforts and interests of others—still less of that true and beautiful wisdom which remembers always that the sum of domestic happiness is made up of seeming trifles, the little acts of self‐sacrifice, the light words and looks of every hour, and takes care to shed round them all, the sunshine of unselfish love and kindness.
Mrs. Hardman received Elizabeth Maynard into her house because it seemed to her
that her husband had given very sufficient reasons why she should do so; but it
was no part of her business to love her, or to supply her with that measure of
affection which is as necessary to human life as refreshing water to the
traveller in the desert. Elizabeth was consigned to a
Mrs. Hardman took the most careful and annoying cognizance of her every word and action, and there were few which she did not find it necessary to reprehend, in the arrogance of her own fancied perfection. Elizabeth’s sorrow for the absence of her sister she considered a most childish and ridiculous weakness. Her grief for her father’s loss, after the period of her mourning had expired, was positively improper, as being contrary to all laws of etiquette.
Mrs. Hardman could not compassionate the follies which circumstances had given her no temptation to commit, and she would have spurned a penitent from her feet with as little pity as though she was never to stand one day in fearful need of mercy herself. Let no one think that the evil of his own soul is to injure himself alone. These peculiarities of Mrs. Hardman’s character had a terrible effect on the fate of the orphans committed to her care.
The first gleam of sunshine which penetrated into Elizabeth’s most cheerless
existence was an event which took place about a year after her
Man has a strange sympathy with nature. In the solitude which is filled with earth’s loveliness alone, he seems to lose the sentiment of individuality, and the sting is taken from all personal sorrows; he finds himself suddenly in blessed companionship with the glorious stars, and the fragrant flowers, and the waving trees; and these all seem to call out to him, saying, “Be not dismayed, though thou art sad at heart and lonely; behold, we are the creatures of thy God, and thou mayest read in our beauty of His goodness and loving‐kindness.”
To Elizabeth Maynard it seemed new life when she first learned how deep is the eloquence of the living nature, in telling, by the things seen and temporal, of those which are unseen and eternal.
There is not in all England a more charming spot than the village of B—, near
which her
There are rich pasture lands, soft and undulating as the green hunting‐fields of the Indian’s Paradise; thick shadowy woods, where the sunshine glances like hope on the soul, and the singing‐birds make merry with the long summer day; and a quiet murmuring river, that glides along serene and bright as a good man’s life.
The village itself, although a portion of it is disfigured by the public house,
dissenting chapel, and one or two houses of unseemly pretension, is singularly
picturesque; little thatched dwellings nestling among the ivy, inhabited, as the
prettiest cottages always are, by withered old women most quaint and simple;
huge old trees filling up three quarters of the diminutive gardens, and a broad
road turning and winding amongst them, every here and there displaying by an
abrupt descent a bright glimpse of the far‐spreading landscape beyond. But the
fairest object of all is the beautiful church, with its old grey tower, and the
more
The light within it is dimmed by the thick branches of the great trees that hang over its green and still churchyard, where the long grass waves on the humble graves of the lowly dead. At night, when the moon is high, there is one broad flat tombstone all wet with the evening dew, on which its pure rays gleam with extraordinary brightness while the rest are left in shadow, as though it would prove how even the grave can be made radiant by a light from heaven.
But the moment when this fair English church is seen to most advantage is at the setting of the sun, when a gush of golden light flows through it from the west, like a path for the angels desiring to enter there; and brightens with a warm glow the stained glass of the rich east window, whilst through the low arch of the open doorway, the evening star may be seen going up into heaven, there to shine with its pure pale light, like a silver lamp burning before the shrine of the Eternal.
Mr. Hardman fixed his residence at “The Mount,” a fine old place close to the village, which was destined to become the scene of the events here recorded.
Mr. Clayton, the vicar of the parish, was
He was a noble‐hearted old man; a Christian like unto those who of old were wont to manifest their sincerity in martyrdom, and show forth the brightness of their hopes in torture. He had sought from his youth upward to make his life as it were a sacrament, of which the inward and spiritual grace was faith, the outward and visible sign good works.
Pure in doctrine, uncompromising in practice, his standard of holiness seemed to
many whom he taught almost hopelessly exalted; all things were with him resolved
into the simple question of right or wrong; he never allowed his feelings and
affections, or even his compassion, to interfere with his rigid discharge of
duty. From this course, so essentially
Mr. Clayton had one only child, a son whose birth he had hailed as the crowning joy in his cup of happiness, and at whose hand it was decreed he should receive the full measure of his trial and tribulation in this world.
Richard Clayton had already grown to man’s
There is chaos on the human mind till the Spirit of God moves over it and dwells in it; and, despite these bright flashes of goodness, like meteor lights in the gloom, there was darkness yet on the soul of Richard Clayton, even as once on the face of the deep.
Within the shrine of his own spirit, where the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth
eternity, and yet dwelleth with the contrite and humble, should have reigned
supreme, he had set up the idol Self, before whom he bowed down and worshipped.
It might have seemed strange that, with his father’s bright example before him,
Richard Clayton should so have
It had been Mr. Clayton’s fondest wish, that his son should follow his own high calling; but as Richard’s character developed itself, he not only abandoned the idea, but he would himself have refused his consent. His child was very dear to him, but dearer still the glory of his God. Not to such an one as Richard could he ever have allowed the inestimable privilege of ministering in the sanctuary; but his son did not desire it, nor was it at all necessary for him to adopt any profession, as Mr. Clayton had succeeded to a considerable property shortly after he had obtained the living of B—, which would ultimately revert of course to his son.
Richard remained therefore without any occupation for his time, which he devoted chiefly to field sports and similar amusements.
Mr. and Mrs. Hardman very soon manifested a strong desire to cultivate the acquaintance of the vicar and his family, and it was not long before Richard became a constant visitor at the Mount.
Mr. Clayton saw them occasionally, for he considered them as his parishioners for the time being; but they were singularly uncongenial to himself on all points, and it was some time before he understood the motive of his son’s frequent visits to their house.
Richard had found a powerful attraction in the society of Elizabeth Maynard. The
first feeling with which she inspired him was one of profound compassion for the
position in which she was placed. He saw that her young life was wasting away
cheerless and dark, unbrightened by one ray of the sweet human love which is the
sunshine of this world, and whose gentle influence is mighty in power to still
the tempests and the cutting blasts of sorrow which every mortal man shall meet
with on his path of life. For her, whose gaze was yet too dim to discern the
glory of
Her vivid imagination and warm feelings, having no holier aliment whereon to feed, were centred altogether in the joys of earth, and she felt keenly that desolation of affection which is perhaps the saddest trial this life can offer us.
Richard had, as we have said, much kindliness of disposition, though weak and unstable in principle. He endeavoured, by his anxious friendship and tender sympathy, to dispel her bitter sense of loneliness; and he perceived that in consequence her whole heart turned irresistibly to him, with all the concentrated strength of that tenderness which had been allowed to flow in no other channel.
Richard knew that the true and devoted affection of such a person as Elizabeth was by no means a gift to be despised; he could not bear to cast it from him by indifference or contempt, as some might have done; and before the summer was over, their marriage was announced as a settled affair.
Richard acted on impulse, that instinctive law so attractive to our human nature,
by which no man ought to be guided; at the same time he was too essentially
selfish to have taken this step had he not been really attached to Elizabeth.
His attachment, however, was very dif‐
Their marriage gave great satisfaction. Mr. Clayton would indeed have preferred that the life‐long companion of his son should have been a more decided servant of the cross; but Elizabeth seemed humble‐minded and docile, well disposed to profit by the instructions he would now have an opportunity of giving her; and he trusted that she was one whose soul could not long remain in exile from the only source of life and joy which can satisfy our immortality. He trusted much to her influence with Richard, should she indeed become what he hoped; and he gladly afforded them the means of living in comfort, by making an ample allowance to his son.
Mr. and Mrs. Hardman were highly pleased at finding themselves thus suddenly relieved of the care of both their wards; for Elizabeth had made it the sole condition of her marriage that Agnes should reside with them entirely, and that she should never be separated from her sister so long as she remained unmarried.
To this Richard willingly agreed, and it was further decided that they should take up their residence at “The Mount,” where Agnes was to join them after having spent some time in London with the Hardman family.
The delight of Agnes at these arrangements was unbounded, and her letters to her sister were full of such vivid anticipations of happiness for the whole party, that Elizabeth trembled as she read them, with that vague terror which arrests us when we look with too much hope into the future.
Agnes did not leave Paris for London until the week before the wedding took place. On the day when she was expected, Richard came to Mr. Hardman’s at Elizabeth’s own request, in order that he might be present at her sister’s arrival.
They were sitting alone together in the drawing‐room, when the carriage drove to
the door, and Elizabeth started to her feet that she might hurry to welcome her.
Before, however, they could even reach the door, it burst open, and Agnes flew
into the room breathless with an overwhelming joy, and flung herself
half‐sobbing half‐laughing into her sister’s arms. For a moment neither spoke;
the orphans, who had so long been all in all to each other, were together once
more, and their happiness was too
Elizabeth turned with a proud delight to present her to Richard, but she stopped
short suddenly when she saw his face, whilst an indescribable pang shot through
her heart;—her future husband was standing with his eyes fixed on Agnes, gazing
at her with a look of the most warm and unqualified admiration, a look such as
had never been bestowed on herself! At a moment like this, one of a temper less
jealous and suspicious than Elizabeth Maynard would never have dreamt of
bestowing a thought on this trifling circumstance; but she was, as we have said,
peculiarly sensitive in disposition; her affection for Richard Clayton was so
absorbing that her whole heart and mind were bound up in it, and she had not a
thought unconnected
But in another instant she repelled this unworthy feeling almost with horror, for
she remembered how, in a very few days, Richard Clayton would hold for Agnes
Maynard the sacred name of
Richard welcomed her frankly and warmly by that title, telling her, with the
utmost kindness in his look and tone, that she must teach him the duties of a
brother, as he had never known that gentle tie, which is the source of so much
true and enduring happiness on earth. He was in fact greatly interested in the
orphan sister of his future wife, for Elizabeth had not
SOME time had elapsed since the marriage of Elizabeth and Richard Clayton; already the spring was brightening into summer for the second time since they had resided at “the Mount;” and the interval had, to all appearance, been a season of unmixed prosperity for them all.
Mr. and Mrs. Clayton enjoyed the utmost esteem and consideration among the
inhabitants of B— and the vicinity, whilst their sister, Agnes Maynard, was a
universal favourite. Her peculiarly attractive appearance, sweet disposition,
and joyousness of spirit, had won the affection of all to whom she was known.
The birth of a daughter had been no small
And yet, surrounded with all these outward blessings, Elizabeth Clayton was very
wretched. Her father‐in‐law had in vain endeavoured to draw the wandering gaze
of her dimmed eyes upward to that glorious Star, on which if a man look
steadily, he shall learn to take no heed of the mortal tempests roaring round
his head, or the fading of all mortal joys; he had found an insurmountable
barrier to all his efforts in the overwhelming and almost idolatrous love which
she bore to her husband. The love of Him, who first loved us, alone should reign
supreme in the immortal soul, and all other feelings be the rather called fourth
by it, as flowers give out fragrance when the sun shines on them; but if an
earthly affection, however lawful in itself, be permitted to supersede it,
thereby becoming
Day and night, waking and sleeping, Elizabeth had no thought but for her husband; watching his every word and look, thinking she never could do enough to please him, and harassing both herself and him by exacting an amount of attention and tenderness which she was by no means justified in expecting. The one overpowering idea which was always present in her mind, was the conviction that his attachment for her fell far short of her own in depth and fervour.
She was, in fact, very right in her opinion, but this was no excuse for the
unreasonable manner in which she wearied him with her repining at his coldness.
She should have remembered that there is but one affection that can be of any
real value to those who inspire it, it is that love, noble and disinterested,
which is pure from the slightest taint of selfishness; which has for its sole
object and desire the happiness of those on whom it is bestowed. She should
never have allowed her own feelings and desires to interfere in the most minute
particular with his comfort. If she discovered that her presence wearied him,
she should have
It was not unnatural that Richard, annoyed and often irritated at her unceasing
watchfulness, should gladly turn from her to seek the society of Agnes, whose
gaiety and light‐heartedness rendered her so pleasing a contrast to the anxious
care‐worn wife. He never acted under the guidance of principle, but he
habitually obeyed a law scarce less exacting, for he invariably followed the
bent of his own inclination, without pausing to scrutinize his motives, or to
examine into the possible result of his actions. It therefore never occurred to
him, that it must have cost poor Elizabeth many a bitter pang to see him so
openly preferring the society of her sister; while Agnes, with that careless
egotism
Thus, while to a casual observer all was bright and prosperous in the lives of the Clayton family, there was ripening in the heart of her who should have been the happiest, one of those dark tragedies which often run their course in the narrow compass of an individual mind alone.
Soon, however, the anxieties and fears of Elizabeth took a new shape. Her health began to fail her altogether. She had reduced herself to a very weak and nervous state, solely by distress of mind and harassing annoyances; and now the conviction had settled with a dull dead weight upon her heart, that she should not survive the birth of her second child.
This idea was in reality but an imagination springing from her morbid state of
mind, for which there was not the slightest foundation; but the conviction,
deeply rooted, ate like a canker into her soul. It was not death which she
dreaded, not the coffin and the shroud; nor yet, chained to the dust as she was
by the ties of earth, the awful judgment to come; but it was the horror of the
dread which filled her
Over these ideas the jealous heart of Elizabeth
The sincere attachment of Richard to their sister Agnes became the source of her utmost joy and thankfulness; he would never consent to part with her sister, now become in affection, as well as in actual fact, his own also; he would never send her away to a miserable and cheerless existence with the Hardmans: no, Agnes would remain with him to take carevof her little niece, of whom she was devotedly fond; and so long as she continued unmarried, she would prevent; the possibility of another wife entering into the house of which she would be the beloved inmate. This idea gave a totally new current to Elizabeth’s thoughts; it was like balm to her wounded spirit; she could look forward with perfect calm to her death, when she felt convinced that, so far from her place being filled by a rival, Richard and Agnes would remain alone together to remember her, and talk of her often with unchanging love, whilst her little Mary would find in the young aunt the same tender and watchful friend which she had herself been to Agnes.
Elizabeth had never concealed from either
Now, however, she repeatedly implored of them both to promise her that Agnes should always remain with her brother‐in‐law; urging as her reason for wishing it, that to her alone would she commit the care of her little daughter, and the new‐born babe if it survived.
Both were very willing to promise their poor Elizabeth all she desired, but neither of them had the slightest apprehension for her life. Their medical adviser was too skilful a physician not to know that her fears were perfectly groundless, and he had completely reassured Agnes on the subject; they therefore contented themselves with soothing her in the mean time, and looked forward anxiously to the period when all anxiety should cease.
Such was the state of matters at “The Mount,” when Elizabeth took her seat one fine evening in the early summer at the drawing‐room window, which was thrown wide open that she might enjoy the soft mild air; directly below it was a smooth piece of turf, on which Richard was slowly walking to and fro in conversation with his father’s Curate.
Mr. Lambert was one of those characters which are, too unfortunately, rare in this world, but of which alone shall doubtless be composed the population of that Holy City, where nothing that defileth shall in any wise enter in: with a powerful mind, and many a noble intellectual quality, he had sought and attained to the innocency of life and humility of heart of a little child, who once was set as an example to the gifted of this earth.
From the hour when he had received the awful commission for the work and office of a priest in the Church of God, he had, with determinate resolution, set the seal of “Holiness to the Lord” on every action of his future life. Severe and unflinching towards himself in following out this difficult course, he was ever most gentle and merciful to others; winning back to the old paths with sweet persuasive accents those who had erred and strayed, and dealing with penitents in the spirit of that unutterably blessed and touching declaration which has been as the words of life to many a sinking soul—“ Neither do I condemn thee.”
Notwithstanding his youth, there was a peculiar calm and dignity in his manner
which won the respect of all whom he approached; though few would have
suspected, from his habitual silence and reserve, that there was in his cha‐
Their conversation was distinctly audible to Elizabeth as she sat at the window, and she soon became so deeply and painfully interested in it that she forgot to ascertain whether they were aware of her vicinity. Richard had asked Mr. Lambert what was the cause of a tumult which he had witnessed that morning at the church door, as he passed through the village.
Mr. Lambert answered that it had originated in one of those distressing cases which were often a source of so much annoyance to the clergy. Two persons had come before him to be married; they did not belong to this parish of B—, and the banns had been published elsewhere; consequently, it was not until they were actually within the church that he discovered the relationship in which they already stood to one another. The woman was sister to the former wife of the man.
“Of course I refused to marry them,” he added quietly.
“Then you share my father’s opinion,” said Richard. “I think him quite absurdly rigid on this point. I cannot coincide in the strong objection which is raised against it by so many. Such a marriage might often be a very convenient arrangement.”
“And a most unhallowed alliance,” said Mr. Lambert, warmly.
“You will find few to look upon it in that light,” replied Richard; “think how frequently the connexion is made without the slightest scruple.”
“There is nothing so common in this world as evil,” said Mr. Lambert, with quiet emphasis; “you may give men authority to commit the greatest crimes with impunity, if they are to find their license for it in the practice of others.” He paused, for Richard’s peculiar position rendered this a subject scarce fit for discussion.
Richard, however, would not let the matter drop till he had very clearly made known his own opinion; he spoke much of the advantage which might result from such an arrangement, in procuring for the children of the deceased wife so kind and natural a protectress as their aunt.
Mr. Lambert replied, that, were the matter viewed as it ought to be, there could be no more reason why the sister of the mother should not remain to take care of the children than the sister of the father himself. Even on the score of expediency alone, he could show the incalculable evil of such connexions, bringing distrust and misery and confusion into the nearest and dearest relations of life; but it was on a far higher ground that he would denounce them, that of being altogether repugnant to the will of God; a fact which might be proved from Scripture, and which had been set forth by the authority of the Church in all ages. It was, in fact, a putting asunder of those whom God had joined in the holy tie, whereby he declared that man and wife were to be one flesh: if there were any meaning in those words at all, the relations of the one must become the relations of the other also, and the sister‐in‐law be in the sight of heaven counted as the sister in blood.
Richard could not answer this argument, though he still held to his own opinion; and after a few more remarks from both, the conversation changed. But Elizabeth Clayton had heard enough, and too much.
Richard little knew what deadly power there had been in his words so carelessly
spoken. He did not see, as his voice died away, how a figure
One thought alone was present in the mind of Elizabeth Clayton—a thought so
torturing and unsupportable that she strove to escape from it with that impotent
frenzy which in its full development drives men to the awful crime of
self‐destruction. She had a
Elizabeth had not the strong religious principles which induced Mr. Lambert to
view it with such warm indignation, but she had that which in this instance
supplied their place—the instinctive delicacy of feeling with which a pure mind
must revolt from a transaction so opposed to all that is just and holy.
Had she then, when she gave her orphan sister a home, been but preparing for herself a rival, who would hereafter blot out her very memory from the heart of the husband she loved so well? Oh! surely she had in truth been nourishing a viper in her bosom: but at least it should be so no longer; she would not sit idly by and see another preparing, under such false pretences, to rob her of the love which she would have had her own even in the grave. She started up—Elizabeth was ever violent in her resolutions as well as in her feelings—she went to the door, scarce knowing what she did, strong in one determination only—that Agnes should not stay another day in the house, to rise up between her and the husband whose affection was her lawful right.
Suddenly, as she was about to draw the bolt, she started and staggered back; a
vision passed before her of a scene never forgotten. She saw the pale,
death‐stricken face; the uplifted
“Elizabeth, Elizabeth! I trust to you alone! promise—swear that you will never desert my child; swear that no dearer tie shall ever induce you to forsake your charge!” And she heard, as it were, the echo of her own voice when she answered, child as she was, with such a solemn firmness—
“ Mother, fear not; I promise—I
And was it thus she was about to redeem that pledge given to the dead—to fulfil that oath administered on a death‐bed?—by driving forth Agnes, that mother’s youngest darling, from her house and home; casting her out into that dangerous and chilling world, where she would be so friendless and alone!
There was a sudden revulsion of feeling in the breast of Elizabeth; a new horror rose out of the idea of this unhallowed marriage. Was Agnes, the gentle Agnes, so fair and joyous, thereby to become a being unworthy of the favour of heaven, and an outcast even from society? Was the sister for whom she had indulged in so many a bright ambitious dream, reserved for such a fate as this?—a wife disowned both by the laws of God and man!
Elizabeth flung herself down once more with a sort of powerless despair. Which of
these two was she to hate the most, whom, until now, she had so dearly loved—the
husband, who, by his selfish act, might blight and blacken the whole existence
of her only sister; or the sister, who, under that sacred name, had stolen into
the husband’s heart, to dwell happy in his love when
There is a peculiar faculty in the human mind, which sometimes causes it, when a
new and absorbing idea is first presented to it, at once to grasp it in its full
extent, in all its bearings—past, present, and future. Elizabeth’s vivid
imagination would not allow her to find consolation in the great uncertainty of
the evil she dreaded; it carried her on at once to antici‐
Meanwhile Richard and Agnes sat together in the drawing‐room below. “Where is Elizabeth?” said Agnes, at last; “I have not seen her at all this evening.”
“I really do not know,” said Richard, indifferently; “perhaps she has gone to lie down. She fancies herself fatigued now, whenever she has made the slightest exertion. Do go and sing to me, Agnes,” he continued, flinging aside his book; “this is just the hour when I can best enjoy music.”
Agnes complied, and in a few minutes Elizabeth could distinguish, through the choking sobs that were bursting from her own lips, the sweet tones of her sister’s voice, as she sang, one after another, the favourite songs which her husband most preferred.
“It is strange that Elizabeth does not come,” said Agnes, after a time; “she never goes to spend the evening in her room without telling us at least. I must go and see where she is.”
“Some fancy!” said Richard, in a tone of
Agnes made no answer: it had often seemed strange to her that Elizabeth was not in truth more uniformly happy, with so many blessings round her. She left the room in search of her sister; but in an instant she returned, with an agitated step, and a look of terror on her face, usually so bright and sunny.
“Dear Richard, come quickly!” she exclaimed; “I quite fear that Elizabeth is very ill: her door is locked, and she made no answer when I called, but I can hear her groaning in so strange a manner!”
Richard started from his seat, and bounded up stairs; Agnes followed. They
knocked at the door, and called in vain; but they could hear moan succeeding
moan. Alarmed to the last degree, Richard exerted all his strength, and burst
open the door. The violent shock, and the stunning noise it occasioned, put the
finishing stroke to the agitation of Elizabeth’s nerves and the confusion of her
mind. Her husband rushed in: all that he saw was her form stretched on the
ground, trembling and convulsed. He flung himself on his knees beside her, and
lifted up her head; whilst Agnes, kneeling close to him, drew back the long
Her gaze fell upon Agnes, and her heart revolted with unnatural horror against her dear and only sister. Half frantic, she started up: with the strength almost of a maniac, she seized Agnes by the arm, which she had rested on the shoulder of Richard, and flung her back with such force, that she fell headlong against the wall. Richard uttered a cry of terror; he really thought she had killed her. He flew to Agnes, and raised her in his arms. She was only stunned, not hurt. She looked up in his face, and smiled, to reassure him. Elizabeth gazed upon them for a moment, as though her quivering frame were turning into stone. Then, stretching out her hands towards her husband, she exclaimed, in words which he then attributed to the ravings of delirium, but which years after haunted him with a fearful meaning, “Oh, Richard, Richard! she is your sister—your sister—your sister!”
There was something so horrible in the tone in which she reiterated these words,
that Agnes
In another hour she was alarmingly ill, and before morning a little feeble child had been brought prematurely into the world, in which it seemed too fragile to exist; and the life of the mother was despaired of.
THESE events had taken place so rapidly and unexpectedly, that Richard
and Agnes had scarce time to speculate on the cause of Elizabeth’s illness,
before they became altogether absorbed in their overpowering anxiety for her
life. Her state became appalling in the extreme; it seemed as though she could
neither live nor die; for she lingered many days after the physicians thought it
impossible she could survive. Some thought for this world, some earthly passion
or feeling, seemed to hold her back when already in the grasp of death; and
whatever that thought might be, it filled her immortal soul, thus standing on
the threshold of eternity, so exclusively, that it swallowed up all anxiety or
fear for the tremendous judgment close at hand. They could not tell what was the
one idea which had power thus to absorb a spirit already summoned into the awful
Presence, for Elizabeth was reduced to a state of weakness which deprived her
altogether of speech. She could not raise herself or move without assistance,
and she would scarce have
It was a horrible thing to see one about to enter into those habitations which are everlasting, whether for good or ill, thus concentrating all her expiring faculties, not on earnest repentance, but on the perishing remnant of the mortal life that now might be reckoned by days and hours. She seemed ever struggling madly to express some one last wish, as though her soul could not go forth till it had uttered certain words; but they could comprehend nothing from her inarticulate efforts;—it was to Agnes that she strove to address herself principally, though also to Richard, and they very naturally concluded that, her whole anxiety was for her children only—that all her endeavours were to make her sister understand that she committed them to her care. Impressed with this idea, Agnes tried to soothe and comfort her, by repeating again and again to her that she understood her wishes, and that she would never leave her children, but that she would make it the business of her life to watch over them and devote herself entirely to them.
Richard also, in the same belief, assured her repeatedly that she might be at peace with regard to the poor little infants whom she must leave behind in this chill world. He would never allow Agnes to leave him—she should stay with him to tend and care for them—they should be consigned completely to her charge.
Those promises which, but for the one horrible idea that now possessed the mind of Elizabeth, would have been to her so inexpressibly soothing and consolatory, served only to madden and torture her as she lay there in her helpless weakness, unable to tell them that they offered for her comfort the very assurance she most dreaded.
Though not without hope, it was yet a death‐bed most unquiet and unblest. Could the dying woman have been altogether disengaged from the engrossing thoughts of this world, it would doubtless have been a season of inestimable profit to her departing soul, for Mr. Lambert attended her assiduously, labouring with unwearied efforts to draw the poor straying sheep in safety to the heavenly fold. But he saw almost with terror that she let the redeemless hours pass recklessly away, with scarce a feeling but for the inward conflict of the heart, whose beating was so soon to cease for ever.
Her father‐in‐law, Mr. Clayton, had been so
But the first feeling predominated; and often
It was a lovely June morning,—the sky was bright, as though it never had a cloud, and the earth radiant, as though it knew no sin. It was just such a day, when it would have been a glorious thing to have seen a ransomed spirit burst the bonds of its clay, and fly from this land of perishing beauty and fading sunbeams up to the fields of light above, where the Sun of Righteousness for ever shines.
All those who had any claim on the affection
She struggled fearfully for utterance; it was so terrible to see her efforts that
Agnes sank upon her knees beside her, and clasping her cold hands,
exclaimed—“Dear, dear Elizabeth, I know what you would say, it is for your
children; fear nothing, they shall be safe and
“Yes,” said Richard, bending over her; “my poor wife, be at rest; do not doubt our love and care; together we will live only to watch over those dear children.”
Some dreadful emotion seemed to shake the whole frame of Elizabeth; with a convulsive effort she half raised herself from her pillow; her eyes glanced with the wildest eagerness from the one to the other; her pale lips moved, and they could distinguish the faltering words, “Agnes—not—marry;” it was all they could hear, but Richard anxiously exclaimed, imagining he had understood at last the meaning of her efforts: —“Agnes, she fears you will marry and leave the poor children, but you will not—you will stay with them.”
“Yes, yes!” exclaimed Agnes, sobbing; “I will, indeed; I will never leave this
house; I promise it to you, my dearest sister.” The gleam faded from the
despairing eyes of the dying woman—an expression of utter hopelessness settled
on her features—they had misunderstood her to the last! It was all over now: it
was too late—she could do no more; life was ebbing; all things had grown
indistinct around her; she must resign herself to the grave, and them to their
unblest union. She
AGNES MAYNARD was within a few months of her majority when Mrs. Clayton died; and the funeral was scarcely over when Mr. Hardman, with systematic propriety, wrote both to herself and Richard for the purpose of arranging her future residence. His letters were first answered by Mr. Clayton, who informed him that it was his own express desire, as well as that of both Agnes and her brother‐in‐law, that she should remain to take charge of her sister’s infant children.
Mr. Clayton’s views respecting such alliances as that, the very thought of which
had terrified Elizabeth into her grave, were so strong and decisive, that it
never occurred to him to suppose that Agnes could ever be considered in any
other light than as the sister of his son. He, therefore, felt it to be most
desirable, both for the children and Richard, that she should be placed at the
head of his establishment under that title; an arrangement which would, in
truth, be highly advantageous
None of the parties concerned in this affair had, however, in appearance at least, the most distant idea of any such alliance; and, consequently, no obstacle seemed to exist against a plan in all other respects so very suitable.
Mr. Hardman was quite satisfied that an arrangement which met with the sanction of the vicar of B—, must be perfectly right, and he imagined that he had gathered from Mr. Clayton’s letter that Agnes and his son were to reside with himself. In this Mr. Hardman was altogether mistaken, as Richard had no intention of quitting The Mount. But this erroneous idea satisfied the demands of Mrs. Hardman’s implacable propriety, and she thankfully consented that Agnes should remain at a comfortable distance from her own less attractive daughter.
Richard Clayton was, during some time, completely absorbed in grief for the loss
of his wife. There are few who can bear unmoved, that the heart which has loved
them best on earth is cold for ever, however little they may have valued the
affection while it lasted. And his sorrow was by no means unmingled with
remorse. He could not endure the society
Agnes herself, though she never ceased to regret her sister, gradually recovered
her natural cheerfulness and gaiety of heart. Occupation is the sovereign remedy
for despondency, and she had but little time now to brood over the past. Full of
the sad enthusiasm with which we seek
The infant, for whom this world’s miseries had commenced almost with his first breath, was a still greater anxiety to his young aunt. During his mother’s illness he had been little attended to, and now he was struggling for the life that seemed to have so slight a hold on his little feeble frame. Richard’s physician told him very plainly that the most constant watchfulness and attention alone could preserve an existence so precarious; and he implored of Agnes, almost with tears, to devote herself to this arduous task; for he had long desired most earnestly to have a son, and he could not bear to think that the gift had only been given to be resumed.
Thus she had much to occupy her thoughts;
She seemed to think that the unbounded indulgence of her feelings at all times
was almost a matter of duty; and her best actions were performed, not because
they were
She visited the poor, not from that blessed motive once given for the performance
of this duty, which makes it the highest privilege on earth, but simply because
it really gave her pleasure to relieve their sufferings; and even her attention
to the little children was the mere natural result of her fond regrets for their
dead mother, and was never viewed by her as a
No one had ever dreamt of questioning the
Thus Mrs. Sharp, with her inquisitive eyes, her busy tongue, and her spiteful
disposition, was an object of terror to the whole neighbourhood—from the vicar,
who generally saw her enter the cottages of his parishioners as soon as he
quitted them, in order to learn what he had been saying, and counteract its
effects, down to the little village girl, who as required to enter into minute
details respecting the quality of her Sunday dinner, and other such interesting
particulars. This lady Agnes Maynard had the misfortune to offend. Mrs. Sharp
had been extremely anxious to cultivate her acquaintance when she found how
intimate she had be‐
It so chanced, that in the course of the second year after the death of Elizabeth
Clayton, Mrs. Sharp went for a few days to London. One of her first proceedings
on arriving there was to call on Mrs. Hardman, as she had long looked forward
with a keen relish to some favourable opportunity of stirring up that
respectable lady to a virtuous indignation against her ward, for
Mrs. Sharp had been acquainted with the family during their six months’ residence at the Mount; and the first polite speeches were scarcely over, when she proceeded gradually to insinuate what was in fact the real object of her visit. She began by looking fixedly and with an air of profound compassion on Mrs. Hardman, and having given vent to several heavy sighs, remarked that she was thankful to see her in tolerable spirits.
“I believe my spirits are generally very good,” said Mrs. Hardman, who sat stiff and impassible as usual. “No one can accuse me of being variable: my temper is even and equable, as it ought to be.”
“Ah, well! you are a very strong‐minded person, I know,” said Mrs. Sharp; “still I must say I expected to see you a little moved by such a trial.”
“Mrs. Sharp, may I ask to what you allude?” inquired Mrs. Hardman. “Trials I have, no doubt, such as I believe no one but a person of my strength of character could have undergone; but I am not aware that you are acquainted with them: they are buried in my own bosom.”
“My dear Mrs. Hardman, I can assure you
“Mrs. Sharp, I beg you will explain yourself,” exclaimed Mrs. Hardman, becoming crimson with anger and impatience; “I cannot guess what you are talking of.”
“Can you not, indeed? Well, then, it must be because you do not see it in the
light that I do, and that every one else does. Perhaps it is not the kind of
misfortune that affects you—people are so different! To be sure, it is not like
a loss of money; but, for my part, I am so sensitive, there is no misfortune I
would not bear sooner than disgrace. It would be to me worse than any
affliction. I declare to you
“Disgrace is not a word that ever applied to me or any of my family,” exclaimed Mrs. Hardman; “I am sure of that, at all events!”
“Of course you are; and that is just what makes this, in my opinion, so heavy a
trial to you. If it had been one of your own family, (and I am sure I hope none
of them ever
“How often am I to tell you that I don’t know what you mean?” screamed Mrs. Hardman, fairly driven out of her usual dignity by her frantic curiosity; “if you have anything to say at all, why don’t you speak out?”
At these words Mrs. Sharp turned slowly round, and fixed her staring eyes on the excited lady with a look of well‐acted astonishment:—“Do you really mean to say,” she replied, as the words dropped from her lips with exasperating coolness, “that you have not heard —”
“I have heard nothing,” shouted Mrs. Hardman, “I have been telling you so for the
last hour!” With that Mrs. Sharp elevated her eyes, shook her head, clasped her
hands, and nodded
Mrs. Sharp, seeing that she had worked up her friend to a suitable state of excitement, at once complied, and hastened to enlarge on the residence of Agnes Maynard in the house of Richard Clayton, in terms which could have been imagined only by a mind not merely devoid of the slightest refinement or delicacy, but of principle also. We say devoid of principle, because, had she judged Agnes and Richard by the high and holy standard set before us all, she could not have considered them otherwise than as brother and sister.
Mrs. Hardman and her husband, who had now come in, shocked and dismayed at the manner in which she spoke, hurriedly demanded if Agnes had not been residing with the elder Mr. Clayton. They had received but few communications from the Mount since the death of Elizabeth, and were, consequently, ignorant of many details.
A triumphant negative was given to their question by Mrs. Sharp, who further
proceeded to mix up with her statement the leaven of falsity and exaggeration
which is always to be
By that night’s post a letter was despatched to Agnes, the joint composition of
Mr. and Mrs. Hardman, in which her present position, as it appeared in the eyes
of the world, was
IT was winter now. Christmas‐tide was scarcely past, and the holly and mistletoe still decorated the walls of the beautiful church where Richard and Agnes had knelt that morning, happy with a strange restless happiness in one another’s society, which they would scarce have ventured to analyze. They agreed that they had never spent a Christmas of such unalloyed gladness. Mr. Clayton always made it his especial care that this season should be one of true rejoicing to every individual in his parish, and they had readily and generously assisted him in this endeavour. Agnes had carried her gifts and good wishes to every house in the village, and there was warmth and light on the humblest hearth amongst them, when the chimes rung out on the clear midnight air, bearing forth the glad tidings of great joy which the angels brought from heaven at the selfsame hour.
In their own house Agnes had taken care
The scene which did in fact await him at the Mount, was a melancholy contrast to
this pleasing vision. He went first to the drawing‐room, already surprised that
no one met him at the door. There was no light there, and the room was in
disorder; but most of all, he missed the sweet face of Agnes brightening so
gaily at his approach. It was the first time she had ever failed to welcome him,
and a sudden foreboding of evil assailed him. He went hurriedly from room to
room in search of her. He called her anxiously, but no answer was returned. At
last a sound of stifled sobbing met his ear. It came from the sleeping room of
his children, and he opened the door at once and went in. Agnes was kneeling
beside the cradle of the little Mary, who had fallen asleep, her cheeks yet wet
with the tears she had shed in her innocent sympathy for the sorrow of her aunt,
though she had been unable to comprehend the
“How can I ever bear to leave her!” she exclaimed; “and still more, how could I leave you, dear Richard, and this happy home—all, all I love in the world! How can I go? I cannot, I cannot! I should die! I know that I should!” She spoke with that frantic impatience of suffering which we should all be disposed to feel, had we no pure and holy motive given us for a calm endurance. Richard was bewildered with astonishment.
“What can you mean, Agnes?” he said; “Where would you go? Who is it that would
dare to take you from me?” She was sobbing so much that she could not answer,
but she pointed to the letter which lay on the ground beside her. He took it up
and read it through. Agnes looked up at him when he had finished it, and she was
perfectly appalled by the storm of passion which convulsed his features. He
“Dear Richard,” she said, “it can do no good to use these terrible words against them; let us think rather what we are to do. I cannot go, I feel that I cannot; it would kill me!”
“You shall not,” said Richard, turning to her almost fiercely. “I tell you, you shall not leave me; no power on earth will induce me to part from you.”
“But how? how?” said Agnes. “I cannot stay when such terms have been used towards me.” She covered her face with her hands as she spoke: her movement seemed to increase the fury of Richard’s indignation, but a stern resolution made him now more calm; he drew away her hands, and bid her look up boldly.
“Agnes,” he said, “I must take this night to consider how the matter had best be
managed, but I charge you in the mean time to remain convinced of this—you shall
not leave me; we shall not be separated, come what may; I will never consent to
part with you.” His tone of
“I will leave it all to you, then,” she said, “for I am bewildered,—I cannot tell
what is to be done. I only know I
“Who indeed? and for their sakes, Agnes, we must not scruple at any measure which shall ensure to them your tender love and watchfulness. Fear nothing, then; go and sleep in peace; to‐morrow we will make some arrangement by which we can defy the world to separate us.”
And Agnes did rest calmly that night with Mary nestling in her arms. She felt as though she must keep guard over this precious child, even through the darkness, lest they stole her away; but she trusted with the most perfect security to Richard’s assurances, nothing doubting that he could perform what he had promised.
For Richard Clayton, however, there was no rest that night; hour after hour he
paced to
He would never have desired to look upon Agnes in any other light than as his sister, had the unlawfulness of a union, such as that which he now projected, been sufficiently felt and understood in this country to have enabled her to remain with impunity in charge of his establishment.
This, however, is not the case,—to the destruction of much domestic happiness, and of many of the holiest and best feelings of our nature. It is certain that the unjustifiable license which has been given to these marriages by the diversity of opinion on this point (so long decided by primitive and holy authority), has driven many to form the connexion from which their better feelings would otherwise have revolted.
Richard Clayton was determined to retain the society of his sister‐in‐law, and by
this arrangement alone could he do so. Therefore, following the inflexible law
of his own inclination, he resolved to accomplish it. He had no
Had Richard known that the world he loved so truly, severe in the enforcement of its own code of conventional laws, has affixed a stigma to the name of him who takes for his wife the woman who has been called his sister, he would perhaps have been prevented by his worship of public opinion from taking that step which his professed Christianity in vain prohibited. He was ignorant, however, of the general feeling which is fortunately so strong on this point, and he anticipated no opposition excepting from his father. Mr. Clayton, he was certain, would view such a deed with the sternest disapprobation.
But Richard had long ceased attempting even to follow in the straight and narrow
path which his father, uncompromising in his high standard of right and wrong,
had traced out before him. He could not have taken one step in such a course,
unassisted by that self‐denial, without which it is worse than mockery to
profess the Holy Christian Faith, but which was a blessing yet unknown to him.
He, therefore, constantly
Richard Clayton had plausibly reasoned himself into the full belief that he was
acting for the best when he went next morning to offer Agnes Maynard the
position of wife in the house where she had dwelt as sister; and yet there was a
feeling of conscious guilt at his heart when she came to meet him with her frank
warm greeting, and addressed him by the name of brother, which, for the first
time, grated so unpleasantly
Yet this was but a vague and weak obstacle wherewith to oppose the concentrated strength of her affection for all those dear ones round her. Had there ever been in her soul one pure and firm determination to follow in the painful steps of Him, who for her sake had not where to lay His head, how willingly would she have abandoned home and friends, and all earth’s dearest joys, rather than have deviated one hair’s breadth from the line of severest holiness and rectitude! But she had never known any such solemn and blessed delivering up of self at the foot of the Cross; she had made herself at all times so much the slave of her own feelings, that it could not be expected that they should fail to obtain the mastery at this the crisis of her fate.
It is needless to repeat all the arguments by which Richard induced her to give
him a favourable answer. They were such as have been mentioned already, and for
a mind constituted like that of Agnes Maynard certainly most powerful. Her
French education had
WHEN the matter was fairly decided, Agnes readily consented to the wish of her future husband, that she would leave all the minor details entirely to him, and not even question him as to his arrangements till they could be put into execution; he was to take all measures requisite with Mr. Hardman and Mr. Clayton; on her he enjoined only the most profound secresy.
During the interval which followed, Agnes seemed desirous to drive the whole
affair from her thoughts altogether. She appeared to be animated with a forced
and unnatural gaiety; laughed and talked far more than usual; and would not
allow the children to quit her for a moment. Richard occupied himself so
incessantly with the necessary and somewhat difficult preparations, that he
excluded all other thoughts; but the truth was, that neither of them was so calm
inwardly as they sought to appear to one another. Without communicating their
feelings to each other, they simul‐
No answer was sent to Mr. Hardman’s letter, and it was speedily followed by another full of the most bitter indignation against Agnes. He concluded by saying, that if she did not appear at his house in London within a given time, he would himself come in search of her to B—.
“We shall pass him on the road,” said Richard scornfully, as he handed the letter to Agnes; “we must be married in London.”
“Not here?” asked Agnes, in a tremulous voice. “Here!” replied Richard, angrily; “what are you thinking of?—how is it possible? do you suppose my father, or Mr. Lambert, would ever consent?” Agnes felt a cold shiver pass through her frame, she scarce knew why, but she made no answer.
Richard had found that it was more easy to decide upon such a step than to put it
in execution; there were several difficulties to be overcome. He had to
investigate into the state of the law respecting marriages of this nature; and
he found, although not at that period declared null and void, as they have since
been by the passing of the Act to that effect in 1835, they were even then
Another obstacle seemed to him more serious, which was the possibility that no clergyman would consent to perform the ceremony. A little reflection, however, soon overcame this difficulty. It was very easy to go to London, where the parish priest of some populous district, in which the names of Richard Clayton and Agnes Maynard were quite unknown, would never think of asking if any peculiar connexion subsisted between them.
Richard wrote to a lady, a cousin of his own, who resided in London, whose theory it was, that all duties which interfered with inclination were overmuch righteousness; and having communicated to her the state of the case, begged of her to receive Agnes into her house during the three weeks which must be given to the publishing of the banns. He received an answer complying with his request and promising secresy. He then told his father that he was going to take Agnes to London for a few weeks to visit a friend, and the next day they left the Mount together.
It was a cold gloomy morning on which
During the three weeks which followed their arrival in London, Richard took care,
with the willing assistance of his cousin, that Agnes should be continually
occupied with some amusement, which left her no time for thought. She was
thankful, indeed, to be spared all reflection; for, in spite of herself, there
was a vague and painful feeling which she could not define, that haunted her at
all times when Richard alluded to their marriage. Even the
There was a heavy weight at the heart of Agnes Maynard, as she looked out and saw the one single carriage that stood at the door, to convey herself and her future husband to the church. Heaven did not smile upon her; for a dull, heavy rain was pouring from the thick black clouds; and she remembered, with the painfully‐superstitious feeling which at times assails us all, the old proverb, that a weeping sky forebodes a weeping bride.
Richard’s cousin accompanied them; but, as she was a lady profoundly devoted to
her own comfort, it was not without considerable difficulty that he could induce
her to leave the house in such weather; and she did not scruple to manifest her
discontent during the whole of their cheerless drive, shivering and complaining
of the cold, without a thought for poor Agnes, who sat crouching in the corner,
pale as death. When they reached the church, the lady ensconced herself in a
pew, and, desiring them to call her when they were ready to return, left them to
proceed alone towards the altar. Agnes
The ceremony was over—the cold, unfelt
They took leave of their cousin at the door of the church, and proceeded to a village on the sea‐shore, where they remained for some little time before they returned to the Mount to take up their residence once more in the home where they had dwelt together under the plea of a relationship of so very different a nature.
RICHARD CLAYTON had written to announce his marriage to his father and
also to his household; and although it was with considerable trepidation that he
awaited a meeting with the former, it never occurred to him to anticipate any
manifestation of feeling on the part of those who formed his establishment. He
never bestowed a thought on persons in that inferior station, and certainly did
not imagine them to be capable of forming an opinion on such a matter as that
now in question. But it is a peculiarity of the lower classes which must have
been remarked by many, that they display a singular delicacy of feeling in their
reverence for the dead. They seem to consider it a holy duty to be most
scrupulous in all things pertaining to the honour of those helpless ones
departed. And though Richard’s servants could not understand how far Agnes had
sinned against all conventional laws by remaining in the house,
This lady, under pretence of visiting the little Mary, had come to the Mount
every day since the departure of Richard and Agnes, in order to glean what
information she could respecting their mysterious journey, which she could not
help connecting with her own visit to Mr. and Mrs. Hardman, and the letter which
she knew they had written in consequence. She was herself under the full belief
that Agnes had returned to her guardian’s protection; and when she heard of
their marriage, she was, to do her justice, sincerely and deeply shocked. In
fact, no person, even worldly minded and unrefined
Richard was furiously angry, Agnes miserable, and their first evening at home was a very sad one.
The next morning, Richard wrote a note to Mr. Clayton, requesting to know when he could see him. It was not without a pang that they felt such a measure to be necessary. The answer was delayed some hours; it came at last, merely a verbal message, naming an hour on the following day, when Mr. Clayton would receive them. They looked forward with the most painful anxiety to the interview. The profound affection which both felt almost equally for him, was mingled with a respect amounting to awe; for it does not require a mind of a high order to feel the influence of superior holiness.
At the appointed hour they walked together to the vicarage. They had to cross the
church‐
It was impossible at the vicarage of B— to be indifferent to the proximity of that holy and beautiful house, with its quiet grass‐grown tombs, telling of the body sown in dishonour and weakness, and its cross, giving a hope of that which is raised in glory and power. It was a blessed thing when some earthly sorrow was at work, and many a hidden pang smote through the soul, to be able at once to lift the eyes to that fair church and think of the sure rest that remaineth for the people of God: but these two, as they sat waiting in the drawing‐room of the vicarage, turned away their eyes from the sight.
It was some time before Mr. Clayton appeared. Agnes had buried her face in her
hands. Richard walked moodily to and fro. He entered at last. Their hearts sunk
within them at sight of him who for their sakes had spent the last three days in
fasting and prayer. He was not stern, but grave and calm; his face had the
traces of bitter suffering, but it wore
They all seemed simultaneously to feel that the customary expressions of welcome and greeting would be a bitter mockery, and for a few minutes no one spoke. The tears which Agnes had shed abundantly over the estrangement of the little Mary were dried up now by the burning blush that crimsoned her face when she found herself standing before that grey‐haired old man, who had so struggled after a rigid and unshrinking holiness, that his life and thoughts were pure as those of an innocent child. Richard seemed endeavouring to conceal his fierce uneasiness, his restless angry suffering. Mr. Clayton looked from the one to the other, and became much agitated; he turned to the window to hide his emotion; the sight probably of the church, at whose altar he ministered as priest, restored to him his courage and his strength. He came and stood before them severe and unmoved.
“It is best we should understand each other,” he said, addressing his son.
“Richard, you have taken a step which you were perfectly aware could only meet
with the most severe and unqualified disapprobation from me; but you will
doubtless say that you have long since cast off
“You need not have said all this, to prove to me what you mean to do,” exclaimed Richard, taking refuge from the painful feelings that oppressed him, in a burst of anger; “I have guessed it from the first. You mean that you will cast us off,—at least that you will not receive us, or come to visit us.”
“I do mean it,” said Mr. Clayton, calmly, though sadly; “since by no other means can I prove to my flock how profoundly I disapprove of your act, now, alas! so irrevocable.”
“What an existence!“ said Richard, rising and pacing the room in violent
agitation; ”father and son living within a few hundred yards of each other on
such terms as these! You will bear it calmly, I doubt not; but to me it will be
insupportable.
“Richard,” said Mr. Clayton, his voice trembling with emotion, “I did not expect that you would do me justice in believing with what bitter anguish to myself I have taken this resolution respecting you; but I have at least an opportunity of showing you that, however rigidly I must adhere to my most painful duty, I have not been without consideration for your feelings. I am quite aware how galling it would be to you to have your residence henceforward so near to mine. I know, also, that it would be very injurious to your prospects in life, were you to quit this place, on many accounts. I have, therefore, determined on leaving B— myself, at the same time openly informing my flock of the reason which induces me to do so. A clergyman with whom I am acquainted, in Kent, has long been desirous of holding this living. I have effected an exchange with him: in a week he comes to this house, and I leave it for ever.”
“Impossible—it cannot be!” exclaimed Richard and Agnes both at once. “Oh no!”
con‐
“I love
Agnes turned away, weeping bitterly. Richard flung himself into a chair, and hid his face on his arm. There was a painful silence for a few minutes, till Mr. Clayton spoke again.
“I have yet a painful task to perform,” he
“We will refuse you nothing,” said Richard, in a voice hoarse from agitation; “you may ask what you will of us.”
“Oh yes,” exclaimed Agnes, “give us the means of making some sacrifice for you who have made such an one for us!”
They were rewarded for these words by the look of tenderness which Mr. Clayton cast upon them both; but he went on:—
“Mary Clayton is my god‐child,” he said; “I am responsible for her spiritual
welfare, and, as her grandfather, deeply interested also in her temporal
concerns. Agnes, it grieves me to utter so painful a truth, but I am compelled
to tell you that I must now consider you as wholly unfit to have the charge of
this child, and that it would be highly injurious to her interests, both earthly
and eternal, were she to remain with you. Her prospects in this world would be
seriously affected by it. It is perfectly clear to me that you have never either
of you viewed the matter in this light,—that you are altogether unaware how
severely your conduct will be denounced in society. Would that you had known it!
it might have deterred you from the
“Do you really mean,” interrupted Richard, “that our marriage will be so strongly
disapproved of by society in general,—by any, in
“I fear you will not have to ask me that question a month or two hence,” replied Mr. Clayton. “I feel certain you will have but too many palpable proofs of the truth of my words. However fearfully corrupt may be the internal machinery of society, they yet have outwardly a code of laws, against which they allow none to rebel with impunity.”
It was evident that this idea was as new as it was bitter to Richard. He saw at once, that if his marriage was a sin against the world’s rule of propriety, he might expect to be visited with no light punishment. He literally groaned as he thought of what he had done, and of what was to come. The union he had contracted, suddenly appeared before him in the light of an irretrievable mistake. Agnes saw what was passing in his mind; and no words can describe how her heart died within her.
“And now,” said Mr. Clayton, “I have shown you why, in a worldly point of view,
it is necessary that Mary should not remain with you. I have myself far higher
motives for requiring of you that she should be entrusted to my own care. I dare
not, Agnes, consider you fit, at least at present, to guide an immortal soul in
that most difficult and painful course
“Agnes, you must not dream of hesitating one instant; he shall have the child. I would rather never see her again, than that my innocent daughter should suffer by any imprudence of yours—or mine,” he added more gently, as he saw her start with the pang his words had caused. “It is better clearly that Mary should go to her grandfather,” continued Richard, bitterly; “we have had a specimen these last two days as to the manner in which the mind of a child may be worked upon; I have no doubt that in a very little time we should find the sacrifice far less severe than it seems to us at present; her health is besides well established now—it was for my little son that I was chiefly desirous to secure your care; there is, therefore, no reason why I should scruple to give my free and full consent, and I wish that the matter should be settled at once.” And it was so decided.
Agnes offered no opposition, she was utterly bewildered and overwhelmed with all
that had passed, she did not even remind him of what rose
Agnes was too much absorbed with a miser‐
Mr. Clayton dismissed them with one parting injunction, addressed chiefly to Agnes. He implored them if sorrow or suffering came upon them, more especially if penitence came—as he prayed it might—to apply at once to Mr. Lambert, and to open their griefs to him; doubtless the Curate would not countenance them now, but in their distress he would be a valuable and faithful friend. They saw that the old man murmured a blessing as they passed him, but Richard was in no humour to feel softened by it: he drew Agnes almost roughly from the room, and they quitted the house that had been as a home to them, with downcast eyes and sorrowful hearts.
Agnes Clayton had never been accustomed, as we have said before, to control her
feelings. She did not remember, that there is a profound selfishness in allowing
those around us to be saddened with the aspect of our suffering; there is enough
of sorrow in this world without our adding to it by constraining others to feel
for us a painful sympathy. We have a
Richard took a long walk, but solitude was unsupportable to him, and he returned
towards evening, trusting to find his house restored to cheerfulness and
comfort. Agnes still lay in the same position; her tangled hair falling over her
face stained with tears, and for the time devoid of beauty. The room was dark
and cold, the whole establishment in confusion.
“Agnes,” he said, “let me beg of you to tell me once for all, whether you intend to render my life insupportable by this absurd and intolerable conduct? Instead of the gaiety and cheerfulness which made you attractive to me formerly, do you mean henceforward to regale me with scenes such as these, tears and ill humour, discomfort and confusion throughout the house?”
Agnes felt her face crimson at these words, with a feeling of something very like anger.
“Have I nothing to make me sorrowful?” she asked, reproachfully.
“Not half so much as I have, at all events,” replied Richard; “but that is not
the question. I wish to tell you most plainly that I will not submit for one
hour to have a dismal companion at my side, complaining and groaning. I will
give you your choice. You have your room, where you may go and weep and pine as
much as you please, but there you must stay. You
Agnes was completely subdued. She fancied that Richard was cruel to her, but still he was her husband, and she loved him. It was a mockery to say that he gave her any choice; she had no alternative; she could not go and shut herself up from him; she must submit to wear ever a smile as gay as her heart was sad. It was with a dreary sense of desolation that she thought how she must drive back all her feelings within her own breast, and never hope for the sympathy which, with her naturally frank disposition, she would so earnestly have sought; but her womanly powers of endurance came to her assistance. She scarce knew with what a strength of determination she at that moment resolved, henceforward, to bear all in silence. She was driven to it, partly by pride, partly by a helpless feeling of submission. She looked up, she dashed the tears from her eyes, and said calmly:—
“I will endeavour to please you; you need not be afraid; I will look sad no
more.” She
MR. CLAYTON left B— the following week, and Mr. Lambert duly communicated to all the parishioners the reasons which had induced him so to do. The event made a most powerful impression on them all. Their Vicar could not have taken any step which could have brought more strongly before them his uncompromising submission to the call of duty whenever it demanded the surrender of his own will, and also his deep disapprobation of that act of his son’s which he was compelled thus openly to reprobate—but he was greatly beloved. His departure was bitterly lamented, and a strong feeling against Richard and Agnes soon pervaded the village. What Mr. Clayton condemned, his people felt must be very wrong, and the marriage was loudly spoken against by all.
Never had Mr. Sharp enjoyed a season of such exquisite repose as that which
followed the departure of the Vicar from B—. This event would alone, at any
time, have been sufficient to have engrossed the mind of his energetic wife, and
provided her with a fund of matter whereon to
What in truth could be more charming than to go from house to house, informing
every one
There was one painful idea, which had long been floating in the minds of those
acquainted with the circumstances, which Mrs. Sharp now assisted in ripening
into certainty—it was the belief that Elizabeth’s melancholy death had been
occasioned by her jealousy of her husband and sister. Such being the case,
nothing certainly could seem more revolting than the whole conduct of Agnes and
Richard; and even the most charitable of their neighhours could not but think
that they were not only devoid of all principle, but heartless and indelicate to
the last degree, in thus speedily reaping the fruits of her death in their
unblest union, and returning, without remorse or fear, to the very home where
she had dwelt whom they had sent to her grave by so cruel a means. Mrs. Sharp
loved to expatiate on these points with a warm enthusiasm, but she found that
her eloquence was scarcely required to heighten the universal indignation. And
then she would
At first Richard and Agnes were scarcely aware of the universal condemnation of
their union. They had become more cheerful, in the hope that their father had
exaggerated the extent to which they would be lowered in the opinion of the
world; but they soon found that he had spoken but too truly; his own proceedings
with regard to them had rendered it necessary for all persons of any weight in
the society of the neighhourhood to adopt a marked line of conduct in the
matter; and their decision was soon made. They were by birth and education
entitled to delicacy of feeling; and Mr. Clayton had not been for
After a time Agnes determined to enliven her dreary hours at least by resuming her visits in the village. Her mind had been so much preoccupied for some time past that she had neglected her poorer friends completely; but she had always been beloved and respected amongst them. She felt that now, humble as they were, even their homage and attention would be soothing to her.
On a beautiful mourning in the early spring, she went out into the village,
nothing doubting that she would be received as she had always been; for she and
her husband had never thought of inquiring into the opinion of their humbler
neighbours respecting their conduct. The first person she went to visit, was old
Martha Hyans, who, with her husband, were parishioners of long standing in the
village of B—. This good old couple exhibited in their lives a practical
refutation of the saying, that love cannot exist in a cottage, more especially
if it be allied to poverty. The little hut where they dwelt had been decked,
fifty years before, for their wedding‐day; and the love that bound them, now
wrinkled and decrepit as they were, was fresh and pure as in their prime of
youth and joy. They had gone through many trials together in that narrow space,
but never had an unkind word passed the lips of either. Poor Elizabeth had often
felt that she might have learnt a valuable lesson from old Martha’s patient and
tried affection; and now, of this good old woman’s many trials, it seemed to her
that one of the greatest was Mr. Clayton’s departure. He had baptized her
children, and laid more than one of them in their graves. She had verily trusted
that he should have closed her eyes also. But he was gone; and
Agnes perceived the change in the old woman’s feelings towards her, the moment
she entered the house. Martha was civil; but she manifested not the slightest
pleasure on seeing her. She did not ask her advice, or detail her grievances,
and positively declined accepting various little comforts which Agnes proposed
to send her. The only words she spoke were, to inquire after the children, in a
tone dearly full of profound commiseration for the little ones. She shook her
head when Agnes volunteered the information that Richard was well, as though she
thought he had no right to be so; and then sat sighing and lifting up her eyes
in the most eloquent manner. Agnes made one last attempt to induce her to speak,
by quoting the Litany, which Martha was in the habit of repeating from beginning
to end, for the edification of her visitors; but even this tempting bait had no
allurements to‐day. She remained unmoved; and Agnes angrily left the house,
Her next visit was to Mrs. Savage, the hard‐featured, large‐handed Mrs. Savage, who was singularly unfortunate in appearance (to the annoyance of all lovers of the picturesque, as her little dwelling was beyond measure charming and romantic), and who appeared for the last twenty years to have been engaged in the care of a huge baby, who never grew, and never became a day older,—a phenomenon which was to be accounted for by the fact that she was constantly supplied with a succession of grandchildren, who, after a certain troublesome age, were removed, to be replaced with another just entering on it.
In the house of this good woman poor Agnes fared much worse than with Martha.
Mrs. Savage did not scruple to tell her openly all she thought and felt, and all
that was thought and felt by her neighbours, on the subject of Richard’s second
marriage; and Agnes brought the visit speedily to a conclusion, by hurrying
She walked along the road towards The Mount, her heart swelling within her, and as she passed on she perceived Thomas, the clerk and schoolmaster, the most respectful and estimable of men, coming towards her. Instead of approaching to give her all the details of the progress of her class or of the choir, he passed on the other side with merely a grave salutation, which sufficiently proved to her that henceforward the doors of the school were closed against her.
She had to pass yet another cottage before reaching home; it was one of the
humblest in B—, and was the abode of a poor imbecile creature, known in the
village by the name of Jack, who lived in it with his old mother. He was
perfectly harmless in his idiotcy, and was allowed to wander about at will, even
within the grounds of The Mount. It was in fact his favourite resort, as Agnes
took a particular interest in him, and always treated him with the utmost
kindness. She used to bring him his food herself, that she might teach him to
recognise her; and now when he saw her, he never failed to greet her with his
wild laugh of discordant glee. Jack was seated at the door of his house as she
approached, and starting
Poor Jack was little aware of the pang which he caused to Agnes at that moment,
for there was in truth a most bitter sting in the thought that his was the first
smile of kindness and the first words of welcome which had been bestowed upon
The bitter experience of this day was quite enough. Agnes now understood what was
in fact the truth, that the poor people of the village had lost all respect for
her, and that consequently her influence amongst them was gone for ever. The
casualties of birth and education are by no means sufficient to command the
esteem of the lower orders. They are keen and penetrating judges as to what is
really estimable in the character of their superiors, and thoroughly alive to
any inconsistency in their precepts and practice. The villagers of B—
The annoyance which all these circumstances caused to Richard and his wife is not
to be told. On the fiery temper and undisciplined mind of the former especially,
the effect was most grievous. He now found himself deprived of all the amusement
which hunting and similar occupations had afforded him, for he was far too proud
ever to place himself voluntarily in the society of those who would no longer
admit him to their houses. Wounded to the uttermost by the treatment he had met
with, he shut himself up entirely in his own house, and gave way to a sullen,
discontented state of mind, which was most distressing to all around him. A man
without employment is always a miserable individual, and he had no intellectual
resources.
In the midst of all this misery, for it was misery both to Agnes and Richard, though no positive misfortune had as yet befallen them, a gleam of sunshine came to revive their hearts in the birth of a son,—an event which soon banished all their regrets for the absence of Mary, who had long since been removed from her father’s house, to enter it no more for years.
On the other poor infant, the son of Elizabeth, Agnes had in truth bestowed the
utmost care and attention ever since her marriage. It had been chiefly on his
account that they had taken this step, which in all other respects had proved so
unfortunate; and it seemed to her an imperative duty to render it productive of
good results to this child at least. With unremitting tenderness she had
therefore watched
It was impossible for Richard and Agnes, as they stood looking down upon that
infant face—sublime now, because of the holy peace that was stamped upon it—not
to perceive how clearly the sin and folly of their deed was pointed out to them
in this bereavement. They had acted against the laws of God and man for the sake
of these children; the one they had
SEVENTEEN years had passed away since the birth of Edward Clayton, the only child of Richard and Agnes, when Mr. Clayton died. His life had been greatly protracted, doubtless, because he laboured well in the vineyard of the Lord; but at length his weary feet were arrested at the gate of the heavenly fold; his aged form was laid down to rest among the green pastures and by the still waters. Mary Clayton knelt beside his coffin, looking for the last time on his serene face; restored now to the look of innocence and of placid rest which only guileless infants and the dead can know; but she shed no tears whilst she laid her cheek upon his cold stiff hand, for she dared not weep for him.
She had been his chief thought and care; for the last years of his life he had
but one wish respecting her, and that was to educate in her a true and devoted
servant for his Master. He set before himself, as the type of what he desired
her to be, a lily of the field—humble, spotless,
Very different had been the education and very different was now the character of
Edward Clayton, Mary’s half‐brother, whom she had seen only at rare intervals.
He resembled his father in disposition; he was clever, impetuous,
It may seem strange that the only child of parents yet living should have been
abandoned to the fatal guidance of his own will; but it arose from the fact,
that although outwardly they held him in control, they had lost all moral
influence over him so soon as he was of an age to gather from the remarks of the
servants and the taunts of his schoolfellows in what light esteem they
themselves were held by the world in general; from that hour he lost all respect
for them, and they became powerless to sway
Richard Clayton had become embittered to the very last degree by the results of
what he now termed his most unfortunate marriage. After the birth of Edward,
when he saw how
Mr. and Mrs. Clayton were, probably, not altogether aware how great was the sin
they committed in allowing an unholy pride to debar
Richard Clayton had taken his first step in the downward course, when he placed his foot within the church where Agnes became his wife; and the descent was becoming daily more abrupt and easy, although he was himself, perhaps, scarce aware of the danger in which he stood, when he began to find relief and satisfaction in scoffing at what he had once at least held sacred. Even Agnes had not learnt, in her fashionable Parisian school, to attach much value to Church principles. Both now resented very strongly the judgment of public opinion, which consigned them, in the midst of a populous neighbourhood, to an exile as complete as though they had been sent to the wilds of Siberia. But this resentment Richard vented on his wife, being unable to give it scope elsewhere.
A torturing conviction took possession of his mind, that the consequences of his
marriage
Edward found that his own position in the world was seriously injured by that of
his father; and whilst he nourished a most unhallowed anger against his parents
for what he considered an injury inflicted on him by them, he was too proud to
court the acquaintance of those who shunned him; and therefore flung
It was impossible for the father and mother not to tremble at the course which it
seemed likely would be taken by their only son. They had made no attempt to
place him in any profession, because Richard had been so completely severed from
all connexion with the world that he would have found great difficulty in
opening out for him any honourable career. Edward was his grandfather’s heir,
and therefore, in a pecuniary point of view, it was not necessary that he should
find any means of existence for himself; but both Richard and Agnes were
passionately attached to their son, and keenly alive to the incalculable evils
which would probably result to him from their unhappy position. This feeling
produced, however, a very different effect upon the minds of each. In Richard it
only increased to an alarming extent the gloomy morbid despondency in which he
indulged, under the belief that all was to go wrong with him henceforward, and
which paralyzed him so much, that he made no attempt to rectify the evil fruits
of his own action, though he failed not bitterly to reproach Agnes as the cause
of it all. Mrs. Clayton meantime felt that her husband was both unjust and
cruel,
That is a beautiful provision of nature, which causes the purest and tenderest
affections of our humanity to be very often the instruments for awakening in our
souls a holier love. In the deep anxiety and terror which the mother felt lest
her only son should suffer by her former conduct, she was led to turn
imploringly to Him who alone could avert the evil she dreaded. But she could not
approach the Throne of all Purity without looking also into her own life, and
learning how far she had erred and strayed from His ways. Her heart was full of
penitence, but she was too much bewildered by the mists and obscurity of a life
of negligence and sin, to understand as yet what the Lord would have her to do,
and how, if she could not retrieve the past, she might at least sanctify the
future by deep submission and repentance. She longed earnestly to apply to Mr.
Lambert for counsel and instruction; but she dared not do it—she dared not brave
the fierce anger which she knew such a proceeding would
Such was the condition of the inhabitants of The Mount at the period of Mr. Clayton’s death. But immediately on this event there followed another, which gave Mr. and Mrs. Clayton the first moment of joy, real heartfelt joy, which they had known for years. Intelligence was brought them of the approaching marriage of Mary Clayton with one to whom it was most desirable, under every point of view, that she should be united.
Mr. Verney was the heir and future representative of a most ancient and noble
house. He was the only child of Lord and Lady Verney, who were chiefly
remarkable for the pride of birth, which was to them almost a hereditary
possession. Forgetting how their name would avail them nothing in the dust,
their whole thoughts and hopes and schemes in this life were given to maintain
the honour of that which had come to them unstained through a long line of
ances‐
If Mr. Clayton had entertained the slightest idea that Mr. Verney wished to marry his granddaughter, he would at once have stated the whole circumstances of his son’s second marriage and present position to Lord Verney, with which it was in fact impossible he could be acquainted, as the family had resided abroad until lately. But the good old Vicar was far too unworldly and simple‐minded to think of such an occurrence at all; he could scarce have believed that his little Mary had left her childhood so far behind her. And his death, somewhat unexpected at the last, occurred before Mr. Verney had taken any steps for arranging the matter beyond his own secret determination.
When Mr. Clayton died, Lady Verney, at her son’s solicitation, persuaded Mary to leave the house where she was now quite alone (as Mrs. Harewood had died some years previously), and conveyed her to their own home, to remain with them till her future plans were arranged.
Mary then communicated to them the fact, that her father was living, and that she had decided, of course, on returning to his house.
This intelligence was rather startling to Lord
Lady Verney could not but agree with Mary, that she ought now at once to repair
to her father’s house, there to pass the time which must intervene till the
period fixed for her marriage. But as they were all anxious that they should not
be completely separated for so many months, the Verneys determined to come
themselves to spend the interval at a place of
IT may be imagined with what delight Richard welcomed his child and her future husband to the home which had so long been cheerless and unblest. He almost fancied, as he looked on his fair and innocent daughter, that she was to be the means of redeeming him from the fatality which pursued him, from the sort of curse which he asserted had settled upon him and his family since the day when he made his sister‐in‐law his wife. Not only did he believe that Mary would herself have a most happy fate, but by her marriage with a man of rank and station, he trusted she would restore to him the honour and consideration he had lost, and she might even regain for him his former footing in society. He forgot in what awful words it had been said, that the sins of the fathers should be visited on the children.
Mary Clayton found much in her father’s house to startle and distress her. Of her
father and step‐mother’s conduct and state of mind she would not allow herself
to form an opinion. At her age and in their relative posi‐
She soon won his warmest affection; for few could know Mary Clayton without
loving her. Her pure and elevated character, and the daily shining forth in all
her actions of the holy faith which Edward had never before seen thus
practically illustrated in the life of an individual, failed not to inspire him
with a degree of respect and almost reverence for his sister, which had a strong
effect upon his mind. Already he had begun to attend to her counsels; he seemed
disposed to admit, at least, the Glory and the Beauty of the Truths which she
set be‐
At this juncture Lord and Lady Verney arrived at B—. They were to spend the first few weeks of their stay in this place at the house of the noble family who had been the most rigid and uncompromising in their just exclusion of Richard and his wife from all respectable society. The marriage of Mary and Mr. Verney had not been announced till the arrival of his father and mother, and they were themselves the first to mention it to their friends.
Their horror and indignation may be imagined at the revelation which followed
from their astonished acquaintance. They were told at once who and what was the
man to whose daughter their son and heir was to be united. They learnt that he
was one who had contracted a union which, by the most holy authority, has been
pronounced a sin worthy to be branded with a fearful name; a union which the
Church of Christ in all ages has openly denounced and solemnly prohibited; so
that none professing themselves members of the same, dare countenance him who
has not feared to disregard that stern prohibition; a union which, if ever in a
Christian country it came to be regarded with
Lord and Lady Verney further learnt that Richard, and the wife who had
co‐operated with him in this sinful act, had been by just and universal judgment
expelled from society in all the bitterness of disgrace. The history of their
life from that period to the present day was then detailed;—the birth of the
son, whose social position was so questionable, that the very companions of his
games taunted him with many a galling name;—the reckless and dissipated course
he was now pursuing, whereby it seemed likely that he would add to the dishonour
which had in fact made him what he was;—the self‐excommunication of Mr. and Mrs.
Clayton, sufficiently showing that they dared not for very shame pass the sacred
threshold of the house of God;—and, finally, the condition to which they had for
some years been reduced, so disgraceful and humiliating,
Amidst the contending feelings of excessive anger and vexation, which filled the minds of Lord and Lady Verney when they had heard all these facts, there were two ideas which predominated over the rest. The first was, a sensation of profound thankfulness, that it was yet time to prevent their only son from contracting the disgraceful alliance, to which no power on earth would ever induce them to consent; and the next, a feeling of the very deepest indignation against Mary and her relations, for having concealed these dishonouring circumstances from them, and so having artfully stolen, as it were, their consent from them.
Their anger at what they held to be an unworthy deception had certainly been
justly incurred by Richard, who ought in strictest honour to have acquainted
them with the whole truth the moment he heard of the proposed alliance; and who
had not done so merely because he was too weak and selfish to risk the failure
of the plan which gave him so much pleasure. A man who once indulges in laxity
of principle, as Richard had done when he married his sister‐
But poor Mary was most innocent of the contemptible and wicked conduct of which they had accused her. No one had ever ventured to enlarge to her upon her father’s sins, or their consequences; she knew far too little of the world to be aware of their peculiar and painful position in society. She was perfectly aware, as a Christian, what a great and grievous sin Richard and Agnes had committed in their marriage; but, as a daughter, she considered it unwarrantable in herself to allow her mind to dwell one moment on their failings; and she had never opened her lips on the subject to any human being, or allowed a whisper connected with it to meet her ear. But as for concealment, Mary was too guileless to suppose that it could exist; she had never doubted but that Lord and Lady Verney were thoroughly acquainted with all circumstances connected with herself and her family.
Meantime, they determined at once to take vigorous measures for terminating an
affair which they considered already but too dishonouring to themselves. That
their son’s name should ever have been even coupled with that of Richard
Clayton’s daughter was a disgrace most galling to their pride. They sent for
They wrote two letters, Lord Verney to Richard, his wife to Mary; the tenor of
both was the same. In unsparing terms they qualified the dishonourable position
of Mr. and Mrs. Clayton; solemnly and with a cruel haughtiness they declared
that nothing should ever induce them to allow their son to have the slightest
connexion with such a family. With the most cutting bitterness they intimated
that if Richard chose to take legal measures for forcing Mr. Verney to keep his
engagement, they were willing to sacrifice their whole fortune to save him from
the disgrace of the proposed marriage;
Richard Clayton was alone when this cruel letter reached him, whereby he saw that
the retribution of his sin, which he termed a curse, so far from being removed
by his daughter’s hand, was now about to take effect upon herself. By this
anticipated marriage he had looked for happiness to Mary, and restored honour to
himself, and straightway his unforgotten deed, his ineffaceable act, rose up
before him, and turned that bright prospect into gloom and bitterness; it
changed the hope of his daughter’s happiness to the certainty of her misery; it
converted the vision of his own renewed prosperity into the palpable evidence of
the actual dishonour that sullied his name with a stain never to be blotted out.
At once his conviction of the fatality which he believed had pursued him ever
since his marriage, (bringing upon him the results of that fatal step in the
shape of unceasing misfortune,) returned to his mind with redoubled vigour. It
had but gained new strength from its temporary banishment by that delusive hope,
and it came to him now in the guise of despair. He saw clearly that the effects
of his crime were coming at last to
Hitherto the punishment of his deed had been administered by the world, because of his dereliction from the merely human laws of morality; but now, for the first time, he perceived and understood his sin in its true nature and actual criminality, for the judgment of God had commenced. Truly Lord Verney’s letter was an awful blow to Richard Clayton.
When Agnes, alarmed at his long absence, entered his room, she found him lying
back in his armchair, speechless and well nigh senseless; breathing only in
short suffocating gasps, his face livid, his whole frame convulsed, his
appearance was fearful. It was clear that he had been stricken with some
physical attack of a dreadful nature. The screams of his terrified wife brought
the servants flocking in. A physician was instantly sent for; he soon arrived,
and seemed quite appalled at the state in which he found Mr. Clayton. He used
the strongest remedies, but for some hours he would give little hope. At length
his patient breathed more freely, his countenance resumed its natural hue, and
without having spoken, or appeared aware of his position, he sunk into a
Agnes literally shuddered at these words. She knew it would be madness even to hope that Richard could henceforward be preserved, either from mental anxiety, or from bitter corroding grief. She had taken Lord Verney’s letter from the stiffened hand of her unhappy husband, and she knew its contents. She had already seen that which Lady Verney had written to her step‐daughter; and she had met the piteous despairing gaze of Mary Clayton’s sweet blue eyes, when she received from it the blow whereby she was smitten to the very dust.
Agnes Clayton betook herself to her knees, crushed and bewildered with anguish,
but she scarce knew what to pray for; it seemed to her a hopeless task to seek
to avert from Richard and herself the misfortunes that were springing so thickly
from the seed they had sown in their reckless sin and folly years ago.
It was some days before Richard was sufficiently recovered to inquire how it
fared with his daughter since she had learnt the utter destruction of her whole
earthly happiness. The misery which Mary Clayton was enduring would have been
altogether insupportable to her but for
Mary would have sunk altogether under this overwhelming burden of sudden trial, had it not been, as we have said, for one thought. It was the recollection of the Love of Him who alone is holy, who only is the Lord, for her that was even as a worm in His sight; a love that was manifest in His unutterable agony, that hereafter might be manifest in her unutterable bliss; that even now was shown forth in the light affliction, enduring but for a moment, wherewith He chastened her, in order that at the last it might bear fruit in a great and exceeding weight of glory. She felt that though by His will the soul may be cast forth into the deep waters of human misery, whose bitterness no earthly power can assuage, still this one hope shall uphold it in the fearful struggle, as with the hand of an angel, and teach it through its very suffering (tempered by submission and faith) that neither in this world nor in the world to come can the redeemed of Christ know aught of despair.
Richard Clayton rose from his dangerous illness a humbled and remorseful man. It
may be doubted whether his was a repentance not
The first meeting between the father and daughter was a terrible one. Richard gave but one glance to that pale sad face, with its look of patient wretchedness, and to the dim eyes from which the sunshine of hope and joy was for ever fled, quenched in bitterest tears, and then he almost crouched down before her as though he would have implored her forgiveness.
Mary understood from that moment that a great duty and task were now set before her, in the soothing and comforting of the father, who had so profoundly though unwillingly injured her. She must not only be resigned, but cheerful; that he might never know how sorely stricken and overwhelmed she was by the sorrow he had brought upon her. She nerved herself at once to this holy effort of filial love, but the struggle was severe, and she felt it would undermine both health and life.
MEANWHILE Mr. Verney was by no means disposed to submit without a struggle to the stern commands of his proud father. His affection for the quiet gentle Mary Clayton had taken deep root in his heart, with a strength of which he was not aware till she was actually taken from him. For the time it absorbed all other considerations, and extinguished whatever pride he might have inherited from his parents. They had accustomed him from childhood to the unrestrained indulgence of every wish, and now when, for the first time, they thwarted him, he resolved to cast off their authority altogether. If they would not give their consent to his union with Mr. Clayton’s daughter, he would marry her without it.
After about three weeks spent in vain expostulations with Lord and Lady Verney,
Mr. Verney went to The Mount, to announce his resolution to Mary, and to obtain
her consent to a private marriage. He was perfectly aware of the depth of the
attachment with which he had
Mr. Verney would not believe it possible that she could continue firm in her
determination, for her extreme agitation showed what the sacrifice cost her, and
he used every argument to induce her to relent. He assured her that as soon as
the marriage was over, and opposition of no further avail, Lord and Lady Verney
would gladly receive her; and he called upon Richard to use all his influence
with her. It was, perhaps, the bitterest pang which Mary Clayton had yet
experienced in this sore trial, when her father, complying with Mr. Verney’s
request, urged her to do that which was actually wrong. Gently and even humbly,
(for was she not his daughter?) she implored of him to desist from further
entreaties, and again quietly repeated her refusal to Mr. Verney. He saw that
she was too resolute in the strait and narrow path of duty, to be allured from
it, though he tempted her with a whole life of happiness; and in his bitter
anger and disappointment, he upbraided her with many a cruel reproach. He
declared that she had never really felt any true affection for him, that she was
cold and heart‐
During Richard Clayton’s illness, Mr. Lambert, now Vicar of B—, had, unasked,
come to visit him, and from that period he continued ministering to the
spiritual necessities of the various members of the family, with faithfulness
and zeal. Agnes had surrendered herself as an humble penitent entirely to his
guidance. Richard himself seemed now well disposed to follow her example; and to
Mary, his counsels were of inestimable benefit. He advised her as to her conduct
towards her father and stepmother, for her position was by no means an easy one
in their house, and he now confirmed and strengthened her in her resolution to
do that which was right, however much suffering it might entail upon herself.
Very soon, however, her miserable father began to fear that she would prove,
with her life itself, the falsity of Mr. Verney’s assertion, that he was the
only
Mr. Verney, though he professed to leave The Mount angry and hopeless, had in truth only felt his esteem and affection for Mary increased by her holy resignation and obedience to the Will of Heaven. He was more than ever determined not to lose her, and he spent his days in devising some means of overcoming the difficulties in his way. Lord and Lady Verney had returned to their own home, but he himself persisted in remaining at B—, though he consented, at their earnest request, to stay at the house of their friends, who received private instructions to watch his proceedings. They were continually enlarging on the disgrace which he would have incurred by his marriage with Mary Clayton; and one day in particular they expatiated much on the miserable position of her brother Edward; who, although he would be allowed quietly to succeed to his father’s property, might have his legitimacy called in question any day.
These casual remarks suddenly gave Mr. Verney a new and hopeful idea. It struck
him that if Mary could be put in possession of the whole of the large fortune
which belonged to the Clayton family, by the setting aside of
He was too much absorbed in his resolution to remember how cruel and selfish he was towards Edward and his unhappy parents, in contemplating such a measure. He quieted his conscience with the conviction, that Mary would make a much better use of the money than her dissipated brother, and never thought of the shame and misery he was bringing upon Agnes, or of her son’s existence thus early ruined and blighted.
Mr. Verney put the question to Mr. Sharp, and received at once a decisive answer.
The passing of the act in 1835, respecting marriages within the prohibited
degrees of affinity, has made the law in the present day different to what it
was at the period to which
He therefore determined to proceed at once to his own home, in order to acquaint
his parents with his plans; but he could not resist the temptation of first
paying a visit at The Mount, that Mary might learn the new hopes which cheered
him. He informed both her and Richard, that he had found a means whereby he
hoped to overcome all the obstacles to their union; and with all the ardour of
his peculiarly sanguine temperament, he assured her, that he doubted not his
parents would soon come themselves to claim her as their daughter. Mr. Verney
was scrupulously careful to conceal from Mary the cruel and wicked scheme he had
Mary never asked, however, what was the plan of which he spoke. She was bewildered with joy; for she implicitly believed his assurance, that they should yet be happy, and the sudden revulsion of feeling was almost too much for her enfeebled frame.
After he left her Mr. Verney wrote to Mr. Sharp, to inform him that his marriage would be concluded very shortly, and that he held him engaged to commence immediately afterwards the legal proceedings against Edward Clayton.
This letter was entrusted by Mr. Sharp to his son, who was in the habit of making
copies of such documents for his father’s use. It so chanced that this young man
had once a violent quarrel with Edward when he was little more than a boy. He
had taunted him, as many others were in the habit of doing, with the
circumstances of his birth, and the insult had been answered by a blow. This
indignity was never forgotten by the lawyer’s son, who was a mean and pitiful
character; and even if he had
That same evening he took Mr. Verney’s letter with him when he went to join a
dinner party of young men, where he knew he should meet Edward. There he openly
repeated the insult which years before had provoked the return he resented; and
when Edward, stung almost to fury at his words, would have called him to account
for them, he flung Mr. Verney’s
It was late in the evening, and the family at The Mount were assembled together in the drawing‐room. Richard and Agnes were both silently watching Mary, whose sweet face, though still pale from recent suffering, was now once again brightened by the light of hope, like sunshine beaming on a placid lake. There was no balm to the wounded conscience of Agnes Clayton like to that of a smile on the face of Elizabeth’s daughter; but Richard could not yet believe there was any happiness in store for them; his health was dreadfully shaken by his late attack, and he was now the victim to a settled despondency. Still the sound of Mary’s cheerful voice was as music to his ears to‐night, and he felt a greater sensation of peace than he had known for many weeks.
Suddenly, as they sat there quietly, there
Edward Clayton rushed into the room, seemingly half frantic; he had never curbed
his anger, even for trifling causes, and now it was ungovernable. His face was
actually livid with rage, his teeth set, the veins starting on his forehead. In
his clenched hand he held a letter, which he flung down before his father, and
in a few words, that sounded to the miserable man like the sentence of a
terrible judgment, he told him how it contained the assurance that he, his
innocent son, should for his parents’ sin be publicly branded with disgrace,
deprived of the property he had always considered his own, and sent out into the
world to struggle in poverty with a blighting stain upon his name. Then (the
sense of his misery, and of the injustice done to him increasing as he spoke,)
Edward looked for a moment on both his parents with a glance they never forgot,
and burst into a storm of invective against them, upbraiding them in terms
To Mary, also, he turned, and thanked her with taunting bitterness for the lessons of Christianity which she had given him; her religion was bearing noble fruit truly, when it permitted her to rob her brother by such a cruel means, and to seek for his ruin and dishonour, that she might herself become the happy wife of her proud lover. He heeded not her wild frantic protestation, that she knew nothing of such a scheme; but, gathering all the passion that was bursting from his lips, as it were into one sentence, he frantically declared, that he would not remain another moment in the place, where he was soon to be stripped of his lawful inheritance, and made an object of public scorn. He would never look again on those who had so injured him; he would go to plunge into the only mode of life, which now was open to him in the haunts of vice and misery; he would find an existence in gaming, or cheating; and when his parents heard of him in disgrace, in crime, in infamy, let them remember that they themselves had driven him to it!
With these words he dashed aside the clinging hands of his mother, who had fallen
almost
For a few moments all three were so paralyzed with the suddenness of this event, that they were incapable of speaking or moving. Mary was the first to awaken from the sort of stupor into which they were plunged: she started up with an expression of so much anguish, that it attracted the attention even of the parents, in whose ears the terrible words of their son were yet ringing.
“He must not go, thinking I could be so base, so wicked!” she exclaimed; “I cannot bear it—I must find him, or I shall never know peace again!” And careless of the rain, which now was pouring down in torrents, or of the chill and gloom of the night, she darted from the house, and followed wildly on the path which Edward had taken.
More than an hour elapsed before Richard could find her again. He sought for her
in vain through the grounds, and out on the road which Edward had already
quitted long since
She was standing fixed and rigid on the steep bank, gazing on the stream with
eyes wide and dilated, unconscious apparently of the drenching rain. Richard
flew towards her—he seized her in his arms, and called her by every endearing
name, but she did not seem to hear him; and he saw at once, by the vacant stare
of her glazed eyes, and the expression of her open mouth, that reason had for
the time deserted her. He could not wonder that it was so, for to a person of
her peculiarly sensitive nature, Edward’s bitter accusation against herself, and
his look and manner when he well‐nigh cursed his parents, was in truth a trial
sufficient, seriously to affect her mind. He carried her back,
MR. VERNEY might have spared all the misery which his unworthy scheme had caused to the Clayton family, for it entirely failed of the effect he had hoped it would have produced on his father and mother. Desirable as wealth would now have been to them, pride was their first idol, and they were true in their allegiance to it.
No advantages which were to be found in the alliance, would have induced them to allow the daughter of Richard Clayton to be the wife of their son and heir; still less, by means of a project against which their honourable feelings revolted, and which would but have entailed a more effectual disgrace on the despised family.
Bitterly disappointed, and hopeless at last, Mr. Verney returned to B— in time to
hear that Mary Clayton lay insensible and dangerously ill. It was known at the
village and at The Mount that Edward was pursuing a reckless course of
dissipation in London. His extravagance was carried on with money borrowed on
false pretences. But his father and
One night, by a most unusual occurrence, Mary was left for a few minutes alone, although her fever was then at its height. Richard and Agnes had quitted her while the nurse arranged the room, and the woman had carelessly gone down stairs, intending to return immediately, and thinking that Mary was asleep.
The peculiar form which her delirium had taken was naturally enough the continual repetition in her own fancy of the scene which had caused her illness. She was incessantly imagining she saw Edward rushing in with his livid distorted face; she heard his terrible words; she saw him leave them, maddened with the injuries they had done him; and she fled out to follow him through the storm and the gloom. Many times she had actually risen to pursue the phantom of her raving, and they had held her down. To‐night the vision returned, and there was no one to prevent her following the wild impulse. She rose from her bed, and, in the strength of fever, fled from the room and the house with noiseless steps.
There was but one person who saw that white ghost‐like figure passing rapidly among the trees. This was old Jack, the idiot, who had come to The Mount for his dinner as usual. Poor Jack was no wiser than he had been years before, when he alone had been found to welcome Agnes Clayton as the wife of her brother‐in‐law; but as his mother was now bedridden from age, she had provided him with a guardian, without whom she would not have allowed him to leave her sight. This was his dog Charlie, who invariably accompanied him wherever he went.
Charlie was certainly not a beauty, espe‐
They were seated together under a tree on this calm mild evening, when poor Mary
tottered past them, moaning and calling out her brother’s
She went staggering on, taking exactly the path she had gone on that fatal night; but when she reached the precipitous bank of the river, her unsteady feet failed her, and she fell headlong into the water. With one single bound Charlie plunged in after her, and he secured a firm hold of her dress as soon as she rose to the surface; then panting, snorting, and struggling, he swam with her to the bank, found footing for himself, and intimated to Jack, by his impatient pulling at the weight so far beyond his own strength, that he was to lift the sinking body from the water. The poor fool understood, and obeyed. He was of great bodily strength, and he drew poor Mary out of the river, with perfect ease, and laid her on the bank, where he stood over her, laughing out in his discordant glee.
Charlie, however, was not yet satisfied; he once more seized hold of Jack, and
drew him towards the house, where, by his vehement barking, and Jack’s
incoherent exclamations, the servants
They took her home, and carried her straight into the first room they came to,
where Richard Clayton was sitting alone. He heard the shuffling feet, and
started up; he saw the men enter with their burden. With the first glimpse he
obtained of that seemingly lifeless form, with the wet hair streaming over her
death‐like face, the terrible idea took possession of him at once that she had
destroyed herself. He had fancied that this was her intention when he had found
her, on that night, standing by the river side, because he knew the depth of her
mental anguish, and he did
Careless and worldly as Richard Clayton had been, he never could have thought,
with any thing but horror, of the awful sin of suicide—that crime which never
can be repented of! And to find that this beloved daughter, for whom he had so
securely anticipated an eternity of happiness, although for his sake
He would have advanced to meet his hapless child, but his steps were suddenly
arrested; it was as though an iron hand had fastened on his heart; its action
was impeded; his breath was choked; his face assumed a dark leaden hue; he well
knew
When Mary Clayton gradually returned to consciousness, the first sight that met her eyes was the corpse of her father, round which those who had carried her from the river were standing in hopeless dismay.
A YEAR and more had elapsed since the awfully sudden death of Richard Clayton; and of all the actors in this tragedy, which had sprung from one single fault, Agnes and Mary alone remained. The youth and good constitution of Elizabeth’s daughter had enabled her to rally from her fever. Her life was spared, but not her intellect; the succession of violent shocks she had received, had completely overthrown her reason, and she rose from her illness a confirmed and helpless idiot.
Shortly after the death of his father, the health of Edward began to give way
completely under the life of dissipation and excess he was leading. At last they
heard that he was sinking prematurely into the grave. Agnes could not leave her
step‐daughter; and Mr. Lambert himself went to London, to ascertain the real
state of matters. He found Edward, deserted now by his gay companions, in an
advanced stage of a hopeless decline. He was still, however, able to bear
removal; and Mr. Lambert brought him back to The Mount,
It was in truth a sore chastisement to Agnes Clayton, thus to lose her only
son,—to see that she had but given him life—that through her means that life
might be unhallowed and unhappy, condemned to an untimely sad decay. But she
bowed to the decree with the meekest submission; for it seemed to her that
nothing could be more distinct than the hand of the retributive Justice, in all
the trials which had visited their house. She and her husband had sinned against
a law, because they believed that law to be unnecessary and overstrained;—they
believed that their departure from it would be
These were the lessons which Agnes Clayton learned from the bitter misfortunes
which had tracked their path since the hour of her unlawful marriage. More
terrible to her even than the death of her son, was the visitation which had
fallen on Mary Clayton, her sister’s child. It was, indeed, an awful punishment
that was inflicted on Agnes, when she was condemned to see before her, day by
day, for the remainder
Her task and duty henceforward were to devote herself exclusively to Mary, the innocent sufferer by a parent’s sin; and it was a touching sight to see how, from the hour of her son’s death, Agnes gave up her life to the solace and comfort of the helpless being now so utterly dependent on her. Sad at heart as she was, haunted by the never‐fading remembrance of those beloved and gone, she yet strove unwearied to amuse her niece, and preserve her from the bodily pain which was the only suffering she now could know; and many times a day she was constrained to kneel down before this living monument of her past sins, and implore of Mary to pardon her, though she knew she could not understand her words; for she was ever stricken with a terrible remorse when she looked into that sad young face, with its unmeaning expression, and wild vacant stare.
It was a comfort to her that poor Mary was happy. She had become as a little child again, as helpless and ignorant, but as free from care. She would sit for hours on the grass, playing with flowers, as in the days when her dead mother watched beside her. One of her chief pleasures was to go to church, although she could not now understand anything which took place within that holy house. Some dim association, connected with the past, seemed to fill her with a vague longing to go there whenever she heard the bell; and Agnes never refused her, as she was always still and quiet during the service. But it was a bitter trial to the widowed, childless woman, to sit beside her there, and see how, instead of the fervent devotion that formerly characterised poor Mary, she now sat smiling childishly, as she held up her thin white hand, to catch the bright colours of the stained glass, when the sunbeam was passing through them. At such moments, Agnes always saw, as in a vision, the scene that had taken place in the cold dark church in London, when she had taken the unlawful vows that never should have been uttered by one who called herself a Christian.
Many wondered that Mrs. Clayton could thus expose herself to the public gaze,
with her whom they could not but term her victim by
There was another haunt, however, which Mary loved especially to frequent; and
this fancy caused Agnes many a sharp remorseful pang, though she did not shrink
from enduring them, for she was willing to submit to all the bitterness of the
punishment laid upon her. It was to the churchyard that she had to follow her
charge, day after day. Some faint recollection of the time before her illness,
when she used to come and sit by her mother’s grave, seemed to compel Mary to go
there constantly; but she came not, as formerly, to think of those who are
departed in the true faith of His holy Name, and pray that herself might have
the perfect consummation and bliss in His eternal