Chapter VII: Introduction: Of the Potato Into France (2)

"I will tell you," replied Brocard, coolly. "Marie, give me the pocket-book from the desk--the red one. September 26th," he continued, after adjusting his spectacles, "Martin Travers, four fifty Bank of England notes," and he read off the dates and numbers, of which I possess no memoranda.

"Why, those are the notes," exclaimed Mr. Elkins, very much startled, and glancing at a list in his hand, "which you paid Mr. Travers for the gold, and which you and others I could name, knew he had not since parted with!"

A slight flush crossed the Frenchman's brow, and the niece's eyes gleamed with fierce expression at these words. The emotion thus displayed was but momentary.

"You are misinformed," said Brocard. "Here is a memorandum made at the time (March 3d) of the notes paid for the gold. You can read it yourself. The largest in amount, you will see, was a twenty."

"Do you mean to persist in asserting," said Mr. Elkins, after several moments of dead silence, "that you did not pay Mr. Travers for his bill of exchange in two one-hundred pound notes?"

"Persist!" exclaimed the Frenchman. "I don't understand your 'persist!' I have told you the plain truth. Persist--_parbleu_!"

I was dumfoundered. "Pray, Monsieur Brocard," said the solicitor, suddenly; "Do you know Mr. Capel?"

The swarthy flush was plainer now, and not so transitory. "Capel--Capel," he muttered, averting his face toward his niece. "Do we know Capel, Marie?"

"No doubt your niece does, Mr. Brocard," said the solicitor, with a sharp sneer, "or that eloquent face of hers belies her."

In truth, Marie Deschamps's features were a-flame with confused and angry consciousness; and her brilliant eyes sparkled with quick ire, as she retorted, "And if I do, what then?"

"Nothing, _perhaps_, young lady; but my question was addressed to your uncle."

"I have nothing more to say," rejoined Brocard. "I know nothing of the hundred pound notes; very little of Mr. Capel, whom now, however, I remember. And pray, sir," he added, with a cold, malignant smile, "did I not hear this morning, that Martin Travers informed the officers that it was a relation, an uncle, I believe, from whom he received the said notes--stolen notes, it seems? He will endeavor to inculpate some one else by-and-by, I dare say."

There was no parrying this thrust, and we came away, much disturbed and discouraged. I remained late that evening at Kensington, talking the unfortunate matter over; but hope, alas! of a safe deliverance for poor Travers appeared impossible, should Brocard persist in his statement. The prisoner's lodgings had been minutely searched, but no trace of the still missing fourteen hundred pounds had been discovered there. Constance Hervey appeared to be greatly struck with my account of Marie Deschamps's appearance and demeanor, and made me repeat each circumstance over and over again. I could not comprehend how this could so much interest her at such a time.

Brocard repeated his statement, on oath, at Bow-street, and Mr. Alley's cross-examination failed to shake his testimony. The first declaration made by Travers necessarily deprived his after protestations, vehement as they were, of all respect; but I could not help feeling surprise that the barrister's suggestion that it was absurd to suppose that a man in possession of the very large sum that had been stolen, would have _borrowed_ two hundred pounds at an exorbitant interest, was treated with contempt. All that, it was hinted, was a mere colorable contrivance to be used in case of detection. The prisoner feared to put too many of the notes in circulation at once, and the acceptance would have been paid for in the stolen moneys, and so on. Finally, Travers was committed for trial, and bail was refused.

As the star of the unfortunate Travers sank in disastrous eclipse, that of Capel shone more brilliantly. There was no doubt that he would succeed, on his rival's conviction, to the vacated post; and some eight or nine weeks after Travers had been committed, circumstances occurred which induced me to believe that he would be equally successful in another respect. I must also say that Capel evinced from the first much sorrow for his old friend's lamentable fall; he treated the notion of his being guiltless with disdain, and taking me one day aside, he said he should endeavor to get Brocard out of the country before the day of trial either by fair means or by tipping him the Alien Act. "In fact," he added, with some confusion of manner, "I have faithfully promised Miss Hervey, that for _her_ sake, though she can have no more doubt of his guilt than I have, that no effort shall be spared to prevent his _legal_ conviction; albeit, life, without character will be, I should think, no great boon to him."

"For _her_ sake! You, Edward Capel, have faithfully promised Miss Hervey to attempt this for _her_ sake!" I exclaimed, as soon as I could speak for sheer astonishment.

"Ay, truly: does that surprise you, Thornton?" he added, with a half-bitter, half-Malvolio smile.

"Supremely; and if it be as your manner intimates, why then, Frailty, thy name in very truth is--"

"Woman!" broke in Capel, taking the word out of my mouth. "No doubt of it, from the days of Eve till ours. But come, let us return to business."

I had been for some time grievously perplexed by the behavior of Constance Hervey. Whenever I had called at Kensington, I found, that though at times she appeared to be on the point of breaking through a self-imposed restraint, all mention of Travers, as far as possible, was avoided, and that some new object engrossed the mind of Constance, to the exclusion of every other. What a light did this revelation of Capel's throw on her conduct and its motives! And it was such a woman as that, was it, that I had enshrined in the inmost recesses of my heart, and worshiped as almost a divinity! Great God!

These thoughts were trembling on my lips, when a brief note was brought me: "Miss Hervey's compliments to Mr. Edward Thornton, and she will be obliged if, late as it is, he will hasten to Kensington immediately." I had never seen a line of hers before in my life, and it was wonderful how all my anger, suspicion, scorn, vanished--exhaled, before those little fly-stroke characters; so much so that--but no, I won't expose myself. A hack soon conveyed me to Kensington; Mr. Hervey, Constance, and good Aunt Jane were all there in the parlor, evidently in expectation of my arrival. Miss Hervey proceeded to business at once.

"You have not seen Marie Deschamps lately, I believe?"

"Not I! The last time I saw her was in Bow-street, whither she accompanied her scoundrel of an uncle."

"Well, you must see her again to-morrow. She is deeply attached to Mr. Capel, and expects that he will marry her as soon as Martin Travers is convicted; and he, Capel, has secured the vacant place."

"Ha!"

"Mr. Capel," continued Miss Hervey, and a glint of sparkling sunlight shot from her charming eyes, "has been foolish enough to prefer another person--at least so I am instructed by papa, with whom the gentleman left this note, not yet opened, addressed to me, some three hours since. I can imagine its contents, but let us see."

I can not depict in words the scorn, contempt, pride--triumph, too--that swept over that beautiful countenance. "Very impassioned and eloquent, upon my word," she said; "I only wonder such burning words did not fire the paper. Now, Mr. Thornton, you must see this forsaken damsel, Marie Deschamps, and acquaint her with Mr. Capel's inconstancy. She will require proof--it shall be afforded her. In answer to this missive, I shall appoint Mr. Capel to see me here to-morrow evening at seven o'clock. Do you bring her by half-past six, and place yourselves in yon little ante-room, where every thing done here, and every word spoken, can be distinctly seen and heard. This well managed, I am greatly deceived in those southern eyes of hers if the iniquitous plot, of which there can be no doubt she holds the clew, will not receive an unlooked-for solution."

"Charming! glorious! beautiful!" I was breaking into _éclats_ of enthusiastic admiration, but Miss Hervey, who was too earnest and excited to listen patiently to rhapsodies, cut me short with, "My dear sir, it's getting very late, and there is, you know, much to be done to-morrow." It's not pleasant to be let down so suddenly when you are so particularly stilty, but as I was by this time pretty well used to it, I submitted with the best possible grace, and, after receiving some other explanations and directions, took leave.

I obtained an interview without difficulty, on the following morning, with Marie Deschamps, just before office hours, and in her uncle's absence. She was curious to know the object of my visit; but her manner, though free and gay, was carefully guarded and unrelenting, till I gradually and cautiously introduced the subject of Capel's infidelity. It was marvelous how, as each sentence fell upon her ear, her figure stiffened into statue-like rigidity, and her eyes kindled with fiery passion. "If this be so," she said, when I ceased speaking, "he is playing with his life! Is she the lady I passed a fortnight since, when with him in the Park?" "Describe the lady, and I will tell you." She did so; it was the exact portrait of Miss Hervey, and so I told her. "I had a misgiving at the time," she said; "if it prove true--but I will believe, after what has passed, only my own eyes and ears."

This was all we desired; a satisfactory arrangement was agreed upon, and I left her, not without hugging self-gratulation that _I_ was not the recreant sweetheart about to be caught _in flagrante delicto_ by such a damsel.

I watched Capel that day with keen attention. He was much excited it was evident, and withal ill at ease: there was a nervous apprehensiveness in his manner and aspect I had never before noticed, over which, however, from time to time quick flashes of exultation glimmered, sparkled, and then vanished. Is it, thought I, the shadow of a sinister catastrophe that already projects over and awes, appalls him? It might be.

Marie Deschamps and I were ensconced punctually at the hour named, in the little slip of a closet communicating with the Herveys' up-stairs sitting-room. Nobody appeared there till about five minutes to seven, when Constance, charmingly attired, and looking divinely--though much agitated, I could see through all her assumed firmness--entered, and seated herself upon a small couch, directly in front of the tiny window through which we cautiously peered. "No wonder," I mentally exclaimed, "that Capel has been beguiled of all sense or discretion!"

In reply to Marie Deschamps' look of jealous yet admiring surprise, I whispered, pointing to the neat but poor furniture, "Capel expects, you know, soon to have six hundred a year." "Ah," she rejoined, in the same tone, "and in this country gold is God!" "And all the Saints in yours, I believe; but hark! there is a knock at the door; it is he, no doubt."

Comparatively dark as the closet was, I could see the red, swarthy color come and go on the young woman's cheeks and forehead; and I fancied I could hear the violent and hurried beating of her heart. Presently Mr. Capel entered the apartment; his features were flushed as with fever, and his whole manner exhibited uncontrollable agitation. His first words were unintelligible, albeit their purport might be guessed. Miss Hervey, though much disturbed also, managed to say, after a few moment's awkward silence, and with a half-ironical yet fascinating smile, taking up as she spoke a letter which lay upon the table, "Upon my word, Mr. Capel, this abrupt proposal of yours appears to me, under the circumstances, to be singularly ill-timed and premature, besides--"

The lady's discomposure had, it struck me, dissipated a half-formed suspicion in Capel's mind that some trap or mystification was preparing for him, and, throwing himself at the feet of Constance, he gave way to a torrent of fervent, headlong protestation, which there could be no question was the utterance of genuine passion. Marie Deschamps felt this, and but that I forcibly held her back, she would have burst into the room at once: as it was she pressed her arms across her bosom with her utmost force, as if to compress, keep down, the wild rage by which she was, I saw, shaken and convulsed. Miss Hervey appeared affected by Capel's vehemence, and she insisted that he should rise and seat himself. He did so, and after a minute or so of silence, Constance again resolutely addressed herself to the task she had determined to perform.

"But the lady, Mr. Capel, whom we saw you conversing with not long since in the Park; one Marie--Marie, something?"

"The name of such a person as Marie Deschamps should not sully Miss Hervey's lips, even in jest, ha!--"

No wonder he stopped abruptly, and turned round with quick alarm. Till that moment I had with difficulty succeeded in holding the said Marie, but no sooner was her name thus contemptuously pronounced, than she plucked a small, glittering instrument from her bodice--the half of a pair of scissors, it seemed to me, but pointed and sharp as a dagger--and drove it into my arm with such hearty good-will, that I loosed her in a twinkling. In she burst upon the utterly astounded Capel with a cry of rage and vengeance, and struck furiously at him right and left, at the same time hurling in his face the epithets of "liar!" "traitor!" "robber!" "villain!" and so on, as thick as hail, and with maniacal fury. I had instantly followed, and at the same moment Mr. Hervey, and the officer who arrested Travers, came in by another door. I and Mr. Hervey placed ourselves before Constance, who was terribly scared, for this stabbing business was more than we had looked or bargained for. The officer seized Marie Deschamps' arm, and with some difficulty wrenched the dangerous weapon she wielded with such deadly ferocity from her grasp. It was, as I supposed, a sharpened scissors-blade, and keen, as a large scar on my arm still testifies, as a poinard. Capel, paralyzed, bewildered by so unexpected and furious an attack, and bleeding in several places, though not seriously hurt, staggered back to the wall, against which he supported himself, as he gazed with haggard fear and astonishment at the menacing scene before him.

"And so you would marry that lady, thief and villain that you are!" continued the relentless young fury; "she shall know, then, what you are; that it was you contrived the stealing of the bank notes, which--"

"Marie!" shrieked Capel, "dear Marie! for your own sake, stop! I will do any thing--"

"Dog! traitor!" she broke in, with even yet wilder passion than before, if it were possible; "it is too late. I know you now, and spit at both you and your promises? It was you, I say, who brought my uncle the one-hundred pound notes by which your _friend_, Martin Travers, has been entrapped!"

"'Tis false! the passionate, mad, jealous fool lies!" shouted Capel, with frantic terror.

"Lie, do I? Then there is _not_ a thousand pounds worth of the stolen notes concealed at this moment beneath the floor of your sitting-room, till an opportunity can be found of sending them abroad! That, unmatched villain that you are, is false, too, perhaps?"

She paused from sheer exhaustion, and for a brief space no one spoke, so suddenly had the blow fallen. Presently the officer said, "The game is up, you see, at last, Mr. Capel; you will go with me;" and he stepped toward the unhappy culprit. Capel, thoroughly desperate, turned, sprang with surprising agility over a dining-table, threw up a window-sash, and leapt into the street. The height was not so much, but his feet caught in some iron railing, and he fell head foremost on the pavement, fracturing his skull frightfully. Before an hour had passed, he was dead.

Brocard contrived to escape, but the evidence of Marie Deschamps and the finding of the stolen notes, in accordance with her statement, fully established the innocence of Travers, and he was restored to freedom and his former position in the world. He and Constance Hervey, to whom he owed so much, were married three months after his liberation, and I officiated, by particular desire, as bride's father.

I had lost sight of Marie Deschamps for some twelve or thirteen years, when I accidentally met her in Liverpool. She was a widow, having married and buried a M. L'Estrange, a well-to-do person there, who left her in decent circumstances. We spoke together of the events I have briefly but faithfully narrated, and she expressed much contrition for the share she had taken in the conspiracy against Travers. I fancied, too--it was perhaps an unjust fancy--that, knowing I had lately been promoted to four hundred a year, she wished to dazzle me with those still bright eyes of hers--a bootless effort, by whomsoever attempted. The talismanic image daguerreotyped upon my heart in the bright sunlight of young manhood, could have no rival there, and is even now as fresh and radiant as when first impressed, albeit the strong years have done their work, yet very gently, upon the original. It could scarcely be otherwise, living visibly, as she still does, in youthful grace and beauty in the person of the gay gipsy I am, please God, soon to "give away," at St. Pancras Church, as I did her grandmamma, more than forty years ago, at Kensington. Constance, _this_ Constance is, as she well knows, to be my heiress. Travers, her grandfather, is now a silver-haired, yet hale, jocund, old man; and so tenderly, I repeat, has Time dealt with his wife--the Constance Hervey of this narrative--that I can sometimes hardly believe her to be more than about three or four and forty years of age. This is, however, perhaps only an illusion of the long and, whatever fools or skeptics may think, or say, elevating dream that has pursued me through youth and middle age, even unto confirmed old bachelorhood. Madame L'Estrange, as before stated, died a short time since at Liverpool; her death, by influenza, the paper noticed, was sudden and unexpected.

WONDERFUL TOYS.

Very wonderful things are told by various writers of the power of inventive genius in expending itself upon trifles. Philip Camuz describes an extraordinary automaton group that was got up, regardless, of course, of expense, for the entertainment of Louis the Fourteenth. It consisted of a coach and horses--what a modern coachman would designate "a first-rate turn-out." Its road was a table; and, at starting, the coachman smacked his whip, the horses began to prance; then, subsiding into a long trot, they continued until the whole equipage arrived opposite to where the King sat. They then stopped, a footman dismounted from the foot-board, opened the door, and handed out a lady; who, courtesying gracefully, offered a petition to his Majesty, and re-entered the carriage. The footman jumped up behind--all right--the whip smacked once more; the horses pranced, and the long trot was resumed.

Some of the stories extant, respecting musical automata, are no less extraordinary. D'Alembert gives an account, in the "_Encyclopédie Methodique_," of a gigantic mechanical Flute-player. It stood on a pedestal, in which some of the "works" were contained; and, not only blew into the flute, but, with its lips, increased or diminished the tones it forced out of the instrument, performing the legato and staccato passages to perfection. The fingering was also quite accurate. This marvelous Flautist was exhibited in Paris in 1738, and was made by Jacques de Vaucanson, the prince of automaton contrivers.

Vaucanson labored under many disadvantages in constructing this marvelous figure; among others, that of a skeptic uncle; who, for some years, laughed him out of his project. At length, fortune favored the mechanist with a severe illness; and he took advantage of it to contrive the automaton he had so long dreamt of. This was at Grenoble; and, as Vaucanson designed each portion of the figure, he sent it to be made by a separate workman; that no one should find out the principle of his invention. As the pieces came home, he put them together; and, when the whole was completed, he crawled out of bed, by the help of a servant who had been his go-between with the various operative mechanics, and locked his chamber door. Trembling with anxiety, he wound up the works. At the first sound emitted from the flute, the servant fell on his knees, and began to worship his master as somebody more than mortal. They both embraced each other, and wept with joy to the tune which the figure was merrily playing.

None of Vaucanson's imitators have been able to accomplish the organization by which his figure modified the tones, by the action of the lips; although several flute-playing puppets have since been made. About forty years ago there was an exhibition in London, of two mechanical figures, of the size of life, which performed duets. Incredulous visitors were in the habit of placing their fingers on the holes of the flutes, in order to convince themselves that the puppets really supplied the wind, which caused the flutes to discourse such excellent music.

A full orchestra of clock-work musicians is quite possible. Maelzel, the inventor of the Metronome, opened an exhibition in Vienna, in 1809, in which an automaton Trumpeter as large as life, performed with surprising accuracy and power. The audience first saw, on entering the room, a tent. Presently the curtains opened, and Maelzel appeared leading forward the trumpeter, attired in full regimentals of an Austrian dragoon. He then pressed the left epaulet of the figure, and it began to sound, not only all the cavalry flails then in use for directing the evolutions of the Austrian cavalry, but to play a march, and an allegro by Weigl, which was accompanied by a full band of living musicians. The figure then retired; and, in a few minutes, reappeared in the dress of a trumpeter of the French guard. The inventor wound it up on the left hip; another touch on the left shoulder, and forth came from the trumpet, in succession, all the French cavalry-calls, the French cavalry march, a march by Dussek, and one of Pleyel's allegros; again accompanied by the orchestra. In the _Journal des Modes_, whence this account is derived, it is declared that the tones produced by Maelzel's automaton were even fuller and richer than those got out of a trumpet by human lungs and lips; because a man's breath imparts to the inside of the instrument a moisture which deteriorates the quality of the tone.

Vaucanson has, however, never been outdone; after his Flautist, he produced a figure which accompanied a flageolet played with one hand, with a tambourine struck with the other. But his most wonderful achievements were in imitating animals. His duck became a wonder of the world. He simulated nature in the minutest point. Every bone, every fibre, every organ, were so accurately constructed and fitted, that the mechanism waddled about in search of grain; and, when it found some, picked it up with its bill and swallowed it. "This grain" (we quote from the _Biographie Universelle_) "produced in the stomach a species of trituration, which caused it to pass into the intestines, and to perform all the functions of digestion." The wonderful duck was not to be distinguished from any live duck. It muddled the water with its beak, drank, and quacked to the life. From men and ducks Vaucanson descended to insects. When Marmontel brought out his tragedy of "Cleopatra," Vaucanson obliged the author with a mechanical Aspic, in order that the heroine might be stung with the closest imitation of nature. At the proper moment the insect darted forth from the side-scenes, and settled upon the actress, hissing all the while. A wit, on being asked his opinion of the play, answered pithily, "_I_ agree with the Aspic."

One never contemplates these wonders without regretting that so much mechanical genius should have been mis-expended upon objects by which mankind are no gainers beyond a little fleeting gratification. Vaucanson did not, however, wholly waste himself upon ingenious trifling. He was appointed by Cardinal Fleury, Inspector of Silk Manufactories, into which he introduced, during a visit to Lyons, some labor-saving improvements. In return for this, the workmen stoned him out of the town; but he conveyed his opinion of their folly by constructing and setting to work a machine which produced a very respectable flower pattern in silk damask by the aid of an Ass. Had his genius confined itself wholly to the useful arts, it is not to be doubted that Vaucanson would have advanced the productive powers of machinery, and, consequently, the prosperity of mankind, at least half a century. In point of abstract ingenuity, his useless contrivances equal, if they do not exceed in inventive power and mechanical skill, the important achievements of Arkwright and Watt. Vaucanson's inventions died with him; those of the great English engineers will live to increase the happiness and comfort of mankind forever.

Single mechanical figures, including the automaton Chess-player (which was scarcely a fair deception, and is too well known to need more than a passing allusion), although surprising for their special performances, were hardly more attractive than the groups of automata which have been from time to time exhibited. One of the Memoirs of the French Academy of Sciences describes, in 1729, a set of mechanical puppets, which were at that time performing a pantomime in five acts. In 1746, Bienfait, the show-man, brought out "The Bombardment of the City of Antwerp," which was performed in the most soldier-like manner, by automata; all the artillery being served and discharged with that regularity which is always attributed to clock-work. A year or two later, the same artist produced "The Grand Assault of Bergem-op-Zoom," with unequivocal success. He called his company _Comédiens praticiens_.

The latest notable effort of mechanical puppet manufacture is exhibited at Boulogne at the present time. It is that of a jeweler, who has devoted eight years of his life to the perfection of a clock-work conjuror; which he has made a thorough master of the thimble-rig. Dressed in an Eastern costume, this necromancer stands behind a table, covered, as the tables of professors of legerdemain usually are, with little boxes and cabinets, from which he takes the objects he employs during the exhibition. He produces his goblets, and shows the balls under them; which vanish and reappear in the most approved style: now two or three are conjured into a spot, a moment before vacant; presently, these disappear again, and are perpetually divided and re-united.

At every exclamation of the spectators, the little conjuror turns his eyes from side to side, as if looking round the house; smiles, casts his eyes modestly down, bows, and resumes his sleight-of-hand. He not only takes up the goblets from a stand, and places them over the balls, but leaves them there for a minute, and holds his hands up, to show the audience that he conceals nothing in his palm or sleeve. He then seizes the goblets again and goes on. This trick over, he puts his cups away, and shuts his cabinet. He then knocks on his table, and up starts an egg, to which he points, to secure attention; he touches the egg (which opens lengthwise) and a little bird starts into life; sings a roundelay, claps its enameled wings--which are of real hummingbirds' feathers, beyond any metallic art in lustre--and then falls back into its egg. The little conjuror nods, smiles, rolls his eyes right and left, bows as before, and the egg disappears into the table; he bows again, and then sits down to intimate that the performance is over. The height of this little gentleman is about three inches; his table and every thing else being in due proportion. He stands on a high square pedestal, apparently of marble. It is, however, of tin, painted white, and within it are all the wheels and works containing the heart of the mystery.

This jeweler sold to a dealer, who re-sold to a Persian Prince, not long since, a Marionnette flute-player; but whose fingering in the most elaborate pieces, although as accurate as if Drouet or Nicholson had been the performers, had no influence over the tune; which was played by a concealed musical box. It was therefore, much inferior to those mechanical flautists we have already described. The jeweler has never ceased to regret having sold this toy. He could have borne to have parted with it if it had remained in Europe, but that it should have been conveyed, as he says, "to the other world," has been too cruel a blow. "_Tout le monde_," he exclaims, "_sera enchanté de mon ouvrage; mais, on ne parlera pas de moi, là-bas_"--all the world will be enchanted with my work, but no one will speak of me yonder--by which distant region, he probably means Ispahan.

He is now perfecting a beautiful bird, which flies from spray to spray, and sings when it alights, somewhat similarly to the little Swiss bird which warbled so sweetly at the Great Exhibition.

MY TRAVELING COMPANION.

My picture was a failure. Partial friends had guaranteed its success; but the Hanging Committee and the press are not composed of one's partial friends. The Hanging Committee thrust me into the darkest corner of the octagon-room, and the press ignored my existence--excepting in one instance, when my critic dismissed me in a quarter of a line as a "presumptuous dauber." I was stunned with the blow, for I had counted so securely on the £200 at which my grand historical painting was dog-cheap--not to speak of the deathless fame which it was to create for me--that I felt like a mere wreck when my hopes were flung to the ground, and the untasted cup dashed from my lips. I took to my bed, and was seriously ill. The doctor bled me till I fainted, and then said, that he had saved me from a brain-fever. That might be, but he very nearly threw me into a consumption, only that I had a deep chest and a good digestion. Pneumonic expansion and active chyle saved me from an early tomb, yet I was too unhappy to be grateful.

But why did my picture fail? Surely it possessed all the elements of success! It was grandly historical in subject, original in treatment, pure in coloring; what, then, was wanting? This old warrior's head, of true Saxon type, had all the majesty of Michael Angelo; that young figure, all the radiant grace of Correggio; no Rembrandt showed more severe dignity than yon burnt umber monk in the corner; and Titian never excelled the loveliness of this cobalt virgin in the foreground. Why did it not succeed? The subject, too--the "Finding of the Body of Harold by Torch-light"---was sacred to all English hearts; and being conceived in an entirely new and original manner, it was redeemed from the charge of triteness and wearisomeness. The composition was pyramidal, the apex being a torch home aloft for the "high light," and the base showing some very novel effects of herbage and armor. But it failed. All my skill, all my hope, my ceaseless endeavor, my burning visions, all--all had failed; and I was only a poor, half-starved painter, in Great Howland-street, whose landlady was daily abating in her respect, and the butcher daily abating in his punctuality; whose garments were getting threadbare, and his dinners hypothetical, and whose day-dreams of fame and fortune had faded into the dull-gray of penury and disappointment. I was broken-hearted, ill, hungry; so I accepted an invitation from a friend, a rich manufacturer in Birmingham, to go down to his house for the Christmas holidays. He had a pleasant place in the midst of some iron-works, the blazing chimneys of which, he assured me, would afford me some exquisite studies of "light" effects.

By mistake, I went by the Express train, and so was thrown into the society of a lady whose position would have rendered any acquaintance with her impossible, excepting under such chance-conditions as the present; and whose history, as I learned it afterward, led me to reflect much on the difference between the reality and the seeming of life.

She moved my envy. Yes--base, mean, low, unartistic, degrading as is this passion, I felt it rise up like a snake in my breast when I saw that feeble woman. She was splendidly dressed--wrapped in furs of the most costly kind, trailing behind; her velvets and lace worth a countess's dowry. She was attended by obsequious menials; surrounded by luxuries; her compartment of the carriage was a perfect palace in all the accessories which it was possible to collect in so small a space; and it seemed as though "Cleopatra's cup" would have been no impracticable draught for her. She gave me more fully the impression of luxury, than any person I had ever met with before; and I thought I had reason when I envied her.

She was lifted into the carriage carefully; carefully swathed in her splendid furs and lustrous velvets; and placed gently, like a wounded bird, in her warm nest of down. But she moved languidly, and fretfully thrust aside her servants' busy hands, indifferent to her comforts, and annoyed by her very blessings. I looked into her face: it was a strange face, which had once been beautiful; but ill-health, and care, and grief, had marked it now with deep lines, and colored it with unnatural tints. Tears had washed out the roses from her cheeks, and set large purple rings about her eyes; the mouth was hard and pinched, but the eyelids swollen; while the crossed wrinkles on her brow told the same tale of grief grown petulant, and of pain grown soured, as the thin lip, quivering and querulous, and the nervous hand, never still and never strong.

The train-bell rang, the whistle sounded, the lady's servitors stood bareheaded and courtesying to the ground, and the rapid rush of the iron giant bore off the high-born dame and the starveling painter in strange companionship. Unquiet and unresting--now shifting her place--now letting down the glass for the cold air to blow full upon her withered face, then drawing it up, and chafing her hands and feet by the warm-water apparatus concealed in her _chauffe-pied_, while shivering as if in an ague-fit--sighing deeply--lost in thought--wildly looking out and around for distraction--she soon made me ask myself whether my envy of her was as true as deep sympathy and pity would have been.

"But her wealth--her wealth!" I thought. "True she may suffer, but how gloriously she is solaced! She may weep, but the angels of social life wipe off her tears with perfumed linen, gold embroidered; she may grieve, but her grief makes her joys so much the more blissful. Ah! she is to be envied after all!--envied, while I, a very beggar, might well scorn my place now!"

Something of this might have been in my face, as I offered my sick companion some small attention--I forget what--gathering up one of her luxurious trifles, or arranging her cushions. She seemed almost to read my thoughts as her eyes rested on my melancholy face; and saying abruptly: "I fear you are unhappy, young man?" she settled herself in her place like a person prepared to listen to a pleasant tale.

"I am unfortunate, madam," I answered.

"Unfortunate?" she said impatiently. "What! with youth and health, can you call yourself unfortunate? When the whole world lies untried before you, and you still live in the golden atmosphere of hope, can you pamper yourself with sentimental sorrows? Fie upon you!--fie upon you! What are your sorrows compared with mine?"

"I am ignorant of yours, madam," I said, respectfully; "but I know my own; and, knowing them, I can speak of their weight and bitterness. By your very position, you can not undergo the same kind of distress as that overwhelming me at this moment: you may have evils in your path of life, but they can not equal mine."

"Can any thing equal the evils of ruined health and a desolated hearth?" she cried, still in the same impatient manner. "Can the worst griefs of wayward youth equal the bitterness of that cup which you drink at such a time of life as forbids all hope of after-assuagement? Can the first disappointment of a strong heart rank with the terrible desolation of a wrecked old age? You think because you see about me the evidences of wealth, that I must be happy. Young man, I tell you truly, I would gladly give up every farthing of my princely fortune, and be reduced to the extreme of want, to bring back from the grave the dear ones lying there, or pour into my veins one drop of the bounding blood of health and energy which used to make life a long play-hour of delight. Once, no child in the fields, no bird in the sky, was more blessed than I; and what am I now?--a sickly, lonely old woman, whose nerves are shattered and whose heart is broken, without hope or happiness on the earth! Even death has passed me by in forgetfulness and scorn!"

Her voice betrayed the truth of her emotion. Still, with an accent of bitterness and complaint, rather than of simple sorrow, it was the voice of one fighting against her fate, more than of one suffering acutely and in despair: it was petulant rather than melancholy; angry rather than grieving; showing that her trials had hardened, not softened her heart.

"Listen to me," she then said, laying her hand en my arm, "and perhaps my history may reconcile you to the childish depression, from what cause soever it may be, under which you are laboring. You are young and strong, and can bear any amount of pain as yet: wait until you reach my age, and then you will know the true meaning of the word despair! I am rich, as you may see," she continued, pointing to her surroundings: "in truth, so rich that I take no account either of my income or my expenditure. I have never known life under any other form; I have never known what it was to be denied the gratification of one desire which wealth could purchase, or obliged to calculate the cost of a single undertaking. I can scarcely realize the idea of poverty. I see that all people do not live in the same style as myself; but I can not understand that it is from inability: it always seems to me to be from their own disinclination. I tell you, I can not fully realize the idea of poverty; and you think this must make me happy, perhaps?" she added, sharply, looking full in my face.

"I should be happy, madam, if I were rich," I replied. "Suffering now from the strain of poverty, it is no marvel if I place an undue value on plenty."

"Yet see what it does for me!" continued my companion. "Does it give me back my husband, my brave boys, my beautiful girl? Does it give rest to this weary heart, or relief to this aching head? Does it soothe my mind or heal my body? No! It but oppresses me, like a heavy robe thrown round weakened limbs: it is even an additional misfortune, for if I were poor, I should be obliged to think of other things besides myself and my woes; and the very mental exertion necessary to sustain my position would lighten my miseries. I have seen my daughter wasting year by year and day by day, under the warm sky of the south--under the warm care of love! Neither climate nor affection could save her: every effort was made--the best advice procured--the latest panacea adopted; but to no effect. Her life was prolonged, certainly; but this simply means, that she was three years in dying, instead of three months. She was a gloriously lovely creature, like a fair young saint for beauty and purity--quite an ideal thing, with her golden hair and large blue eyes! She was my only girl--my youngest, my darling, my best treasure! My first real sorrow--now fifteen years ago--was when I saw her laid, on her twenty-first birthday, in the English burial-ground at Madeira. It is on the grave-stone, that she died of consumption: would that it had been added--and her mother of grief! From the day of her death, my happiness left me!"

Here the poor lady paused, and buried her face in her hands. The first sorrow was evidently also the keenest; and I felt my own eyelids moist as I watched this outpouring of the mother's anguish. After all, here was grief beyond the power of wealth to assuage: here was sorrow deeper than any mere worldly disappointment.

"I had two sons," she went on to say, after a short time--"only two. They were fine young men, gifted and handsome. In fact, all my children were allowed to be very models of beauty. One entered the army, the other the navy. The eldest went with his regiment to the Cape, where he married a woman of low family--an infamous creature of no blood; though she was decently conducted for a low-born thing as she was. She was well-spoken of by those who knew her; but what _could_ she be with a butcher for a grandfather! However, my poor infatuated son loved her to the last. She was very pretty, I have heard--young, and timid; but being of such fearfully low origin, of course she could not be recognized by my husband or myself! We forbade my son all intercourse with us, unless he would separate himself from her; but the poor boy was perfectly mad, and he preferred this low-born wife to his father and mother. They had a little baby, who was sent over to me when the wife died--for, thank God! she did die in a few years' time. My son was restored to our love, and he received our forgiveness; but we never saw him again. He took a fever of the country, and was a corpse in a few hours. My second boy was in the navy--a fine, high-spirited fellow, who seemed to set all the accidents of life at defiance. I could not believe in any harm coming to _him_. He was so strong, so healthy, so beautiful, so bright: he might have been immortal, for all the elements of decay that showed themselves in him. Yet this glorious young hero was drowned--wrecked off a coral-reef, and flung like a weed on the waters. He lost his own life in trying to save that of a common sailor--a piece of pure gold bartered for the foulest clay! Two years after this, my husband died of typhus fever, and I had a nervous attack, from which I have never recovered. And now, what do you say to this history of mine? For fifteen years, I have never been free from sorrow. No sooner did one grow so familiar to me, that I ceased to tremble at its hideousness, than another, still more terrible, came to overwhelm me in fresh misery. For fifteen years, my heart has never known an hour's peace; and to the end of my life, I shall be a desolate, miserable, broken-hearted woman. Can you understand, now, the valuelessness of my riches, and how desolate my splendid house must seem to me? They have been given me for no useful purpose here or hereafter; they encumber me, and do no good to others. Who is to have them when I die? Hospitals and schools? I hate the medical profession, and I am against the education of the poor. I think it the great evil of the day, and I would not leave a penny of mine to such a radical wrong. What is to become of my wealth--?"

"Your grandson," I interrupted, hastily: "the child of the officer."

The old woman's face gradually softened. "Ah! he is a lovely boy," she said; "but I don't love him--no, I don't," she repeated, vehemently. "If I set my heart on him, he will die or turn out ill: take to the low ways of his wretched mother, or die some horrible death. I steel my heart against him, and shut him out from my calculations of the future. He is a sweet boy: interesting, affectionate, lovely; but I will not allow myself to love him, and I don't allow him to love me! But you ought to see him. His hair is like my own daughter's--long, glossy, golden hair; and his eyes are large and blue, and the lashes curl on his cheek like heavy fringes. He is too pale and too thin: he looks sadly delicate; but his wretched mother was a delicate little creature, and he has doubtless inherited a world of disease and poor blood from her. I wish he was here though, for you to see; but I keep him at school, for when he is much with me, I feel myself beginning to be interested in him; and I do not wish to love him--I do not wish to remember him at all! With that delicate frame and nervous temperament, he _must_ die; and why should I prepare fresh sorrow for myself, by taking him into my heart, only to have him plucked out again by death?"

All this was said with the most passionate vehemence of manner, as if she were defending herself against some unjust charge. I said something in the way of remonstrance. Gently and respectfully, but firmly, I spoke of the necessity for each soul to spiritualize its aspirations, and to raise itself from the trammels of earth; and in speaking thus to her, I felt my own burden lighten off my heart, and I acknowledged that I had been both foolish and sinful in allowing my first disappointment to shadow all the sunlight of my existence. I am not naturally of a desponding disposition, and nothing but a blow as severe as the non-success of my "Finding the Body of Harold by Torch-light" could have affected me to the extent of mental prostration, as that under which I was now laboring. But this was very hard to bear! My companion listened to me with a kind of blank surprise, evidently unaccustomed to the honesty of truth; but she bore my remarks patiently, and when I had ended, she even thanked me for my advice.

"And now, tell me the cause of your melancholy face?" she asked, as we were nearing Birmingham. "Your story can not be very long, and I shall have just enough time to hear it."

I smiled at her authoritative tone, and said quietly: "I am an artist, madam, and I had counted much on the success of my first historical painting. It has failed, and I am both penniless and infamous. I am the 'presumptuous dauber' of the critics--despised by my creditors--emphatically a failure throughout."

"Pshaw!" cried the lady, impatiently; "and what is that for a grief! a day's disappointment which a day's labor can repair! To me, your troubles seem of no more worth than a child's tears when he has broken his newest toy! Here is Birmingham, and I must bid you farewell. Perhaps you will open the door for me? Good-morning: you have made my journey pleasant, and relieved my ennui. I shall be happy to see you in town, and to help you forward in your career."

And with these words, said in a strange, indifferent, matter-of-fact tone, as of one accustomed to all the polite offers of good society, which mean nothing tangible, she was lifted from the carriage by a train of servants, and borne off the platform.

I looked at the card which she placed in my hand, and read the address of "Mrs. Arden, Belgrave-square."

I found my friend waiting for me; and in a few moments was seated before a blazing fire in a magnificent drawing-room, surrounded with every comfort that hospitality could offer, or luxury invent.

"Here, at least, is happiness," I thought, as I saw the family assemble in the drawing-room before dinner. "Here are beauty, youth, wealth, position--all that makes life valuable. What concealed skeleton can there be in this house to frighten away one grace of existence? None--none! They must be happy; and, oh! what a contrast to that poor lady I met with to-day; and what a painful contrast to myself!"

And all my former melancholy returned like a heavy cloud upon my brow; and I felt that I stood like some sad ghost in a fairy-land of beauty, so utterly out of place was my gloom in the midst of all this gayety and splendor.

One daughter attracted my attention more than the rest. She was the eldest, a beautiful girl of about twenty-three, or she might have been even a few years older. Her face was quite of the Spanish style--dark, expressive, and tender; and her manners were the softest and most bewitching I had ever seen. She was peculiarly attractive to an artist, from the exceeding beauty of feature, as well as from the depth of expression which distinguished her. I secretly sketched her portrait on my thumb-nail, and in my own mind I determined to make her the model for my next grand attempt at historical composition--"the Return of Columbus." She was to be the Spanish queen; and I thought of myself as Ferdinand; for I was not unlike a Spaniard in appearance, and I was almost as brown.

I remained with my friend a fortnight, studying the midnight effects of the iron-foundries, and cultivating the acquaintance of Julia. In these two congenial occupations, the time passed like lightning, and I woke as from a pleasant dream, to the knowledge of the fact, that my visit was expected to be brought to a close. I had been asked, I remembered, for a week, and I had doubled my furlough. I hinted at breakfast, that I was afraid I must leave my kind friends to-morrow, and a general regret was expressed, but no one asked me to stay longer; so the die was unhappily cast.

Julia was melancholy. I could not but observe it; and I confess that the observation caused me more pleasure than pain. Could it be sorrow at my departure? We had been daily, almost hourly, companions for fourteen days, and the surmise was not unreasonable. She had always shown me particular kindness, and she could not but have seen my marked preference for her. My heart beat wildly as I gazed on her pale cheek and drooping eyelid; for though she had been always still and gentle, I had never seen--certainly I had never noticed--such evident traces of sorrow, as I saw in her face to-day. Oh, if it were for me, how I would bless each pang which pained that beautiful heart!--how I would cherish the tears that fell, as if they had been priceless diamonds from the mine!--how I would joy in her grief and live in her despair! It might be that out of evil would come good, and from the deep desolation of my unsold "Body" might arise the heavenly blessedness of such love as this! I was intoxicated with my hopes; and was on the point of making a public idiot of myself, but happily some slight remnant of common sense was left me. However, impatient to learn my fate, I drew Julia aside; and, placing myself at her feet, while she was enthroned on a luxurious ottoman, I pretended that I must conclude the series of lectures on art, and the best methods of coloring, on which I had been employed with her ever since my visit.

"You seem unhappy to-day, Miss Reay," I said, abruptly, with my voice trembling like a girl's.

She raised her large eyes languidly. "Unhappy? no, I am never unhappy," she said, quietly.

Her voice never sounded so silvery sweet, so pure and harmonious. It fell like music on the air.

"I have, then, been too much blinded by excess of beauty to have been able to see correctly," I answered. "To me you have appeared always calm, but never sad; but to-day there is a palpable weight of sorrow on you, which a child might read. It is in your voice, and on your eyelids, and round your lips; it is on you like the moss on the young rose--beautifying while vailing the dazzling glory within."

"Ah! you speak far too poetically for me," said Julia, smiling. "If you will come down to my level for a little while, and will talk to me rationally, I will tell you my history. I will tell it you as a lesson for yourself, which I think will do you good."

The cold chill that went to my soul! Her history! It was no diary of facts that I wanted to hear, but only a register of feelings--a register of feelings in which I should find myself the only point whereto the index was set. History! what events deserving that name could have troubled the smooth waters of her life?