Read Ebook: Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXV No. 3 September 1849 by Various Chandler Joseph R Joseph Ripley Editor Graham George R Editor Taylor Bayard Editor

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FOUND AMONG THE PAPERS OF THE LATE WALTER HERRIES, ESQ.

"Good-night!" how very coldly it was spoken; But those loved tones are lingering near me yet, And though of tenderness they bring no token, I would not, if I had the power, forget.

JASPER ST. AUBYN;

OR THE COURSE OF PASSION.

BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT.

The morning was still very young, and the sun, which was but just beginning to rise above the brow of the eastern hill, poured his long, yellow rays, full of a million dusty motes, in almost level lines down the soft, green slopes, diversified by hundreds of cool purple shadows, projected far and wide over the laughing landscape, from every tree and bush that intercepted the mild light.

The dews of the preceding night still clustered unexhaled, sparkling like diamonds to the morning beams, on every leaf and flower; a soft west wind was playing gently with the thousands of bright buds and blossoms which decked the pleasant gardens; and the whole air was perfumed with the delicate fragrance of the mignionette and roses, which filled the luxuriant parterres. The hum of the reveling bees came to the ear with a sweet domestic sound, and the rich carol of the blackbird and the thrush came swelling from the tangled shrubberies, full fraught with gratitude and glee.

It was into such a scene, and among such sights and sounds, that the young free-trader wandered forth from the tranquillity and gloom of the sick chamber in which he had spent a sleepless night; but his mind had been too deeply stirred by his conversation with Sir Miles St. Aubyn, and chords of too powerful feeling had been thrilled into sudden and painful life, to allow him to be penetrated, as he might have been in a less agitated hour, by the sweet influences of the time and season.

Still, though he was unconscious of the pleasant sights and sounds and smells which surrounded him, as he strolled slowly through the bowery walks of the old garden, they had more or less effect upon his perturbed and bitter spirit; and his mood became gradually softer, as he mused upon what had passed within the last hour, alone in that bright solitude.

Wild and impetuous and almost fierce by nature, he had brooded from his very boyhood upward over his real and imaginary wrongs, until the iron had so deeply pierced his soul, that he could see nothing but coldness, and hostility, and persecution in the conduct of all around him, with the exception of his old student uncle and his sweet Theresa. Ever suspecting, ever anticipating injury and insult, or at least coldness and repulsion from all with whom he was brought into contact, he actually generated in the breasts of others the feelings which he imputed to them all unjustly. Accusing the world of injustice or ere it was unjust, in the end he made it to be so indeed; and then hated it, and railed against it, for that which it had never dreamed of, but for his own fantastic waywardness.

It was unfortunate for Durzil, that the good man, into whose care he had fallen, ever of a philosophical and studious, nay, even mystic disposition, had become, since the sad fate of his beloved sister, and the early death of a yet dearer wife, so wholly visionary, so entirely given up to the wildest theorizing, the most abstruse and abstract metaphysical inquiries, that no one could have been devised less fitting for the guardian and instructor of a high-spirited, hot-headed, fiery boy than he was.

The consequence of this was, as it might have been expected, that disgusted early with the strange sorts of learning which the old man persisted in forcing into him against the grain, and discontented with the stillness and deathlike tranquillity of all around him, the boy ran away from his distasteful home, and shipped for the India voyage in a free-trader, half merchantman, half-picaroon, before he had yet attained his thirteenth year. In that wild and turbulent career, well suited to his daring and contemptuous spirit, he had, as he himself expressed it, become hardened and inured not to toils and sufferings only, but to thoughts and feelings, habits and opinions, which perhaps now could never be eradicated from his nature, of which they had become, as it were, part and parcel.

When he returned, well nigh a man in years, and quite a man in stature, and perhaps more than most men in courage, resource, coolness and audacity, old Allan, to whom he had written once or twice, apprising him that he had adopted the sea as his home and his profession, received him with a hearty welcome, and with few or no inquiries as to the period during which he had been absent.

Thereafter, he came and went as he would, unasked and unheeded. When he was ashore, the cottage by the fords of Widecomb was his home; and his increasing wealth--for he had prospered greatly in his adventurous career--added materially to the comforts of old Allan's housekeeping. His life was, therefore, spent in strange alternations; now amid the wildest excitement--the storm, the chase, the fierce and frantic speculation, the perilous and desperate fight, the revelry, the triumph, and the booty; and now, in the calmest and most peaceful solitude, amid the sweetest pastoral scenery, and with the loveliest and most innocent companion that ever soothed the hot and eager spirit of erring and impetuous man, into almost woman's softness.

And hence it was, perhaps, that Durzil Bras-de-fer had, as it were, two different natures--one fierce, rash, bitter, scornful, heedless of human praise or human censure, pitiless to human sorrow, reckless of human life, merciless, almost cruel--the other generous, and soft, and sympathetic, and full of every good and gentle impulse.

And it was in the latter of these only, that Theresa Allan knew him.

As men are esteemed of men, such they are very apt to be or to become; and, having the repute of chivalrous spirit, of generosity and worth, no less than of dauntless courage, and rare seamanship, the adventurous free-traders of that day held themselves to be, in all respects, gentlemen, and men of honor; and holding themselves so, for the most part they became so.

It was, therefore, by no means either wonderful or an exception to a rule, that Durzil Bras-de-fer should have been such as I have described him, awake to gentle impulses, alive to good impressions, easily subject to the influences of the finest female society, and in no respect a person either from his habits, his tastes, or his profession to be rejected by men of honor, or eschewed by women of refinement.

And now, as he followed slowly on the steps of his beautiful cousin, the young man was more alive than usual to the higher and nobler sensibilities of his mind. The information which he had gained concerning his own father's feelings, at the moment of his death, had greatly softened him, and it began to occur to him--which was, indeed, true--that he might have been during his whole life conjuring up phantoms against which to do battle, and attributing thoughts and actions to the world at large, of which the world might well be wholly innocent.

Up to this moment, although he had long been aware of his constantly increasing passion for his fair cousin, he had rested content with the mild and sisterlike affection which she had ever manifested toward him; and, having been ever her sole companion, ever treated with most perfect confidence and sympathy, having found her at all times charmed to greet his return, and grieved at his departure; knowing, above all things, that at the very worst he had no rival, and that her heart had never been touched by any warmer passion than she felt toward himself, he had scarcely paused to inquire even of himself, whether he was beloved in turn, much less had he endeavored to penetrate the secrets of her heart, or to disturb the calm tenor of her way by words or thoughts of passion.

Now, however, the words, the questions of the old cavalier had awakened many a doubt in his soul; and with the doubt came the desire irrepressible to envisage his fate, to learn and ascertain, once and for all, whether his lot was to be cast henceforth in joy or in sorrow; whether, in a word, he was to be a wanderer and an outcast, by sea and by land, unto his dying day, or whether this very hour was to be to him the commencement of a new era, a new life.

Now, as he walked forth in the beautiful calm morning, in that old, pleasant garden, which had been the scene of so much peaceable and innocent enjoyment, he felt himself at once a sadder and a better man than he had ever been before; and while determined to delay no longer, but to try his gentle cousin's heart, he was supported by no high and fiery hope; he seemed to have lost, he knew not how or wherefore, that proud heaven-reaching confidence, which was wont to count all things won while they were yet to win, still less did his heart kindle and blaze out with that preconceived indignation at the idea of being unappreciated or neglected, which would a few hours before have goaded him almost to frenzy.

He clasped his brow closely with a feverish and trembling hand, as he walked onward slowly, pondering, with his whole soul intent upon the future and the past. He was inquiring of himself, "Does she, can she love me?" and he could make no answer to his own passionate questioning. While he was in this mood, bending his steps toward the favorite bower wherein he half hoped half feared to find Theresa, a soft voice fell upon his ear, and a light hand was laid upon his arm, as he passed the intersection of another shady walk with that through which he was strolling.

"Good-morrow, Durzil," said the young girl, merrily. "I never thought to see you out so early in the garden; but I am glad that you are here, for I want you. So come along with me at once, and tell me if it be not a nest of young nightingales which I have found in the thick syringa bush beside my arbor. Come, Durzil, don't you hear me? Why what ails you, that you look so sad, and move so heavily this glorious summer morning? You are not ill, are you, dear Durzil?"

So singular was the desponding tone in which he spoke, so strange and unwonted was the cloud of deep depression which sat on his bold, intelligent brow, that the young girl stared at him in amazement, almost in alarm.

"If I be," he replied with a smile, for her high spirits and gay enthusiasm aroused him from his gloomier thoughts, and began to enkindle brighter hopes in his bosom, "if I be, thou, Theresa, art the enchantress who has done it."

"Ay! now you are more like yourself; but tell me," she said, caressingly, "what was it made you sad and dark but now?"

"Only this, dear Theresa, that I am again about to leave you."

"To leave us--to leave us so soon and so suddenly. Why you have been here but three little weeks, which have passed like so many days, and when you came you said that you would stay with us till autumn. Oh, dear! my father will be so grieved at your going. You do not know, you do not dream how much he loves you, Durzil. He is a different person altogether when you are at home--so much gayer, and more sociable! Oh! wherefore must you leave us so quickly, and after so long an absence, too, as your last? Oh, truly, it is unkind, Durzil."

"And you, Theresa, shall you be sorry?"

"I will not answer you," she replied, half petulantly, half tearfully. "It is unkind of you to go, and doubly unkind of you to speak to me thus. What have I done to you now, what have I ever done to you, that you should doubt my being sorry. Are not you the only friend, the only companion I have got in the wide world? Are you not as near and dear to me, as if you were my own brother? Do not I love you as my brother, even as my father loves you as his son? Ah, Durzil! if you are never less loved than you are by poor Theresa Allan, you will ne'er need to complain for lack of loving."

And she burst into tears as she ended her rapid speech; for she did not comprehend in the least at what he was aiming, and her innocent and artless heart was wounded by what she fancied to be a doubt of her affection.

"And if you feel so deeply the mere temporary absence which my profession forces on me, Theresa, how, think you, should you feel were that absence to be eternal?"

"Eternal!" she exclaimed, turning very pale. "Eternal! What do you mean by eternal?"

"It may well be so, Theresa; and yet it rests with yourself, after all, whether I go or not--and yet be sure of this, if I do go, I go forever."

"I could be happy here. I am weary of agitation and excitement. I feel that I have erred--that the path I have taken leads not to happiness. I want tranquillity, repose of the heart, above all things--love!"

"Then do not go--then I say positively, Durzil, dear Durzil, stay with us--you can find all these here."

"Are you sure--all of them?"

"Sure? Why, if not here in this delicious, pastoral, simple country, in this dear cottage, with its lovely garden and calm waters, where in the world should you find tranquillity, if not here, in the midst of your best friends, in the bosom of your own family, where should you look for love?"

"Theresa, there be more kinds of love than one--and that I crave is not cold, duteous, family affection."

Now, for the first time, it seemed that the young man's meaning broke clearly upon her mind; now a sudden and bright illumination burst upon all that seemed strange and wild and inconsistent in his conduct, in his speech, in his very silence. Unsuspected before, it was now evident to her at once that deep, overmastering passion was the cause to which she must refer all that had been for some time past to her an incomprehensible enigma in her cousin's demeanor.

And now that she was assured, for the first time in her life, that she was really, deeply, ardently beloved--not as a pretty, childish playmate, not as an amiable and dear relative, but as herself, for herself, a lovable and lovely woman, how did the maiden's heart respond to the great revelation?

Elevated on the instant from the girl to the woman, a strange and thrilling sense, a sort of moral shock affected her whole system--was it of pleasure or of pain?

It has been often said, and I presume said truly, that no woman--no, not the best and purest, the most modest and considerate of their sex--ever receive a declaration of love from any man, even if the man himself be distasteful to her, even if the love he proffer be illicit and dishonest, without a secret and instinctive sense of high gratification, a consciousness of power, of triumph, a pride in the homage paid to her charms, a sort of gratitude for the tribute rendered to her sex's loveliness. She may, and will, repulse the dishonorable love with scorn and loathing, yet still, though she may spurn the worthless offering, and heap reproach upon the daring offerer, still she will be half pleased by the offer--if it be only that she has had the power, the pleasure--for all power is pleasure--of rejecting it. She may, and will, gently, considerately, sympathetically decline the honest offers of a pure love which she cannot reciprocate or value as it should be valued; but even if he who made the tender be repulsive, almost odious, still she must be gratified, perhaps almost grateful for that which he has done.

To a young girl more especially, just bursting from the bud into the bloom of young womanhood, scarce conscious yet that she is a woman, scarcely awake to the sense of her own powers, her own passions--a creature full of vague, shadowy, mysterious fancies, strange uncomprehended thoughts, and half perceived desires, there is--there must be something of wondrous influence, of indescribable excitement in the receiving a first declaration.

And so it was with Theresa Allan. She was, in truth, no angel--for angels are not to be met with in the daily walks of this world--she was, indeed, neither more nor less than a mere mortal woman, mortal in all the imperfection, and narrowness, and feebleness, and inability to rise even to the height of its own best aspirations, which are peculiar to mortality--woman in all the frailty and vanity and variety, no less than in all the tenderness, the truth, the constancy, the loveliness, the sweetness of true womanhood. She was, in a word, just what a great modern poet has described in those sweet lines,

"A creature not too bright or good For human nature's daily food; For transient sorrows, simple wiles, Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and smiles."

and no one who is a true judge of human, and yet more of woman nature will regret that she was such; for he must be a poor judge indeed, he must know little of the real character of womanhood, who does not feel that one half of her best influences, one half of her sweetest power of charming, soothing, controling, winding herself about the very heart-strings, arises from her very imperfections. Take from her these, and what she might then be we know not, but she would not be woman, and until the world has seen something better and more endearing, until a wiser artificer can be found than HE who made her, even as she is, a help meet for man--away with your abstractions! give her to us as she is, at least if not perfect, the best and brightest of created things--a very, very woman.

She heard his words, she felt his meaning, yet the sense of the words seemed to be lost, the very sounds rang in her ears dizzily, her breath came so painfully that she almost fancied she was choking, the earth appeared to shake under her feet, and every thing around her to wheel drunkenly to and fro.

She pressed one hand upon her heart, and caught her cousin's arm with the other to support herself. Her whole face, which a moment before had been alive and radiant with the warm hues of happiness and youth, became as white as marble. Her very lips were bloodless; her whole frame trembled as if she had an ague fit.

He gazed on her in wonder, almost in terror. For a moment he thought that she was about to faint, almost to die; and so violent, in truth, was the affection of her nerves, that, had she not been relieved by a sudden passion of tears, it is doubtful what might have been the result.

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