Chapter V (4)

Her appearance, upon a nearer approach, was not such as to reassure Lucille. She was tall, deadly pale, and marked with the smallpox. She had particularly black eyebrows, and awaited the young lady's approach with that ominous smile which ascends no higher than the lips, and leaves the eyes and forehead dark, threatening, and uncertain. Altogether, there was a character, it might be of insanity, it might be of guilt, in the face, which was formidable.

Lucille wished herself at home, but there was that in the blood of the Charrebourgs which never turned away from danger, real or imaginary, when once confronted.

"So you are Lucille de Charrebourg?" said the figure, looking at her with that expression of malice, which is all the more fearful that it appears causeless.

"Yea, Madame, that is my name; will you be so good as to tell me, beside, the name of the lady who has been kind enough to desire an interview with me?"

"For a name; my dear, suit yourself; call me Sycorax, Jezebel, or what you please, and I will answer to it."

"But what are you?"

"There again I give you a _carte blanche_; say I am a benevolent fairy; you don't seem to like that? or your guardian-angel? nor that neither! Well, a witch if you please, or a ghost, or a fortune-teller--ay, that will do, a fortune-teller--so that is settled."

"Well, Madame, if I may not know either your name or occupation, will you be good enough at least to let me hear your business."

"Surely, my charming demoiselle; you should have heard it immediately had you not pestered me with so many childish questions. Well, then, about this Monsieur Le Prun?"

"Well, Madame?" said Lucille, not a little surprised.

"Well, my dear, I'm not going to tell you whether this Monsieur Le Prun is an angel, for angels they say _have_ married women; or whether he is a Bluebeard--you have heard the story of Bluebeard, my little dear--but this I say, be he which he may, _you_ must not marry him."

"And pray, who constrains my will?" exclaimed the girl, scornfully, but at the same time inwardly frightened.

"_I_ do, my pretty pigeon; if you marry him, you do so forewarned, and if he don't punish you _I_ will."

"How dare you speak in that tone to me?" said Lucille, to whose cheek the insolent threat of the stranger called a momentary flush of red; "_you_ punish me, indeed, if _he_ does not! I'll not permit you to address me so; besides I have help close by, if I please to call for it."

All this time the woman was laughing inwardly, and fumbling under her white robe, as if in search of something.

"I say he may be an angel, or he may be a bluebeard, I don't pretend to say which," she continued, with a perfectly genuine contempt of Lucille's vaunting, "but I have here an amulet that never fails in cases like this; it will detect and expel the devil better than blessed water, _vera crux_, or body of our Lord, for these things have sometimes failed, but this can never. With the aid of this you cannot be deceived. If he be a good man its influence will be ineffectual against him; but if, on the other hand, he be possessed of evil spirits, then test him with it, and you will behold him for a moment as he is."

"Let me see it, then."

"Here it is."

She drew from under the white folds of her dress a small spiral bottle, enameled with some Chinese characters, and set in a base and capital of chased gold, with four little spiral pillars at the corners connecting the top and bottom, and leaving the porcelain visible between. It had, moreover, a stopper that closed with a spring, and altogether did not exceed two inches in length, and in thickness was about the size of a swan's quill. It looked like nothing earthly, but what she had described it. For a scent-bottle, indeed, it might possibly have been used; but there was something odd and knowing about this little curiosity, something mysterious, and which seemed as though it had a tale to tell. In short, Lucille looked on it with all the interest, and if the truth must be spoken, a good deal of the awe, which its pretensions demanded.

"And what am I to do with this little bauble?" she asked, after she had examined it for some moments curiously.

"When you want to make trial of its efficacy, take it forth, look steadily in his face, and say, 'I expect to receive the counterpart of this,' that is all. If he be a good man, as who can say, the talisman will leave him as it finds him. But if he be, as some men are, the slave of Satan, you will see, were it but for a second, the sufferings and passions of hell in his face. Fear not to make trial of it, for no harm can ensue; you will but know the character you have to deal with."

"But this is a valuable bauble, its price must be considerable, and I have no money."

"Well, suppose I make it a present to you."

"I should like to have it--but--but----."

"But I am too poor to part with it on such terms, and you too proud to take it--is that your meaning? Never mind, I can afford to give it, and, proud as you are, you can afford to take it. Hide it until the time to try him comes, and then speak as I told you."

"Well, I will accept it," said Lucille, coldly, but her voice trembled and her face was pale; "and this I know, if there be any virtue of any sort in the toy, it can only prove Monsieur Le Prun's goodness. Yes, he is a very kind man, and all the world, I am told, speaks of his excellence."

"Very probably," said the stranger, "but mark my words, don't marry him; if you do, you shall see me again."

"Halloa, devil! are you deaf?" thundered a sneering voice from a crag at the opposite side. "Come, come, it's time we were moving."

The summons came from a broad, short, swarthy fellow, with black mustaches and beard, arrayed in a suit of dusky red. He had one hand raised high above his head beckoning to her, and with the other he furiously shook the spreading branch of a tree beside him; the prominent whites of his eyes, and his grinning teeth, were, even at that distance, seen conspicuous; and so shaggy, furious, and unearthly did he seem, that he might well have represented some wild huntsman or demon of the wood. It seemed, indeed, as though a sort of witches' dance were to be held that night in the old park of Charrebourg, and that some of the preternatural company had reached the trysting-place before their time.

The ill-omened woman in white hastily gathered up her mantle, without any gesture or word of farewell. With hurried strides her tall figure glided off toward the apparition in red, and both speedily disappeared among the hazy cover at the other side.

The little hollow was now deserted, except for Lucille. It was not till they had quite vanished, and that she was left there alone, that she felt something akin to terror steal over her, and hurried from the scene of her strange interview as from a haunted spot. A little way up the rising bank Gabriel was awaiting her return, sorely disappointed that fortune had in no wise made her debtor to his valor.

Long before she reached home the sun had gone down, and the long dusky shadows had given place to the thin, cold haze of approaching night. Often as she glided onward among rocks and bushes she felt an instinctive impulse, something between terror and aversion, prompting her to hurl the little spiral vial far from her among the wild weeds and misty brakes, where, till doomsday, it might never be found again. But other feelings, stranger in their kind, determined her at least to defer the sacrifice, and so she reached her chamber with the mysterious gift fast in her tiny grasp.

Here she again examined it, more minutely than before; it contained neither fluid nor powder of any sort, and was free from any perfume or odor whatsoever; and excepting that the more closely she inspected it, the more she discovered in its workmanship to excite her admiration, her careful and curious investigation was without result. As she carefully folded up the curious souvenir, and secreted it in the safest corner of the safest drawer, she thought over the interview again and again, and always with the same result as respected the female who had bestowed it, namely, that if not actually a lady, she had at least the education and the manners of a person above the working classes.

That night Lucille was haunted with ugly dreams. Voices were speaking to her in threats and blasphemies from the little vial. The mysterious lady in white would sit huddled up at the foot of her bed, and the more she smiled the more terrible became her scowl, until at last her countenance began to dilate, and she slowly advanced her face closer and closer, until, just as her smiling lips reached Lucille, she uttered a yell, whether of imprecation or terror she could not hear, but which scared her from her sleep like a peal of thunder. Then a great coffin was standing against the wall with Monsieur Le Prun in it dead and shrouded, and a troop of choristers began singing a requiem, when on a sudden the furious voice she had heard that evening screamed aloud, "To what purpose all this hymning, seeing the corpse is possessed by evil spirits;" and then such looks of rage and hatred flitted over the livid face in the coffin, as nothing but hell could have inspired. Then again she would see Monsieur Le Prun struggling, his face all bloody and distorted, with the man in red and the strange lady of the talisman, who screamed, laughing with a detestable glee, "Come bride, come, the bridegroom waits." Such horrid dreams as these haunted her all night, so much so that one might almost have fancied that an evil influence had entered her chamber with the little vial. But the songs of gay birds pruning their wings, and the rustle of the green leaves glittering in the early sun round her window, quickly dispelled the horrors which had possessed her little room in the hours of silence and darkness. It was, notwithstanding, with a sense of fear and dislike that she opened the drawer where the little vial lay, and unrolling all the paper envelopes in which it was carefully folded, beheld it once more in the clear light of day.

"Nothing, nothing, but a grotesque little scent-bottle--why should I be afraid of it?--a poor little pretty toy."

So she said, as she folded it up again, and deposited it once more where it had lain all night. But for all that she felt a mysterious sense of relief when she ran lightly from her chamber into the open air, conscious that the harmless little toy was no longer present.

V.--THE CHATEAU DES ANGES.

The next day Monsieur Le Prun returned. His vanity ascribed the manifest agitation of Lucille's manner to feelings very unlike the distrust, alarm, and aversion which, since her last night's adventure, had filled her mind. He came, however, armed with votive evidences of his passion, alike more substantial and more welcome than the gallant speeches in which he dealt. He brought her, among other jewels, a suit of brilliants which must have cost alone some fifteen or twenty thousand francs. He seemed to take a delight in overpowering her with the costly exuberance of his presents. Was there in this a latent distrust of his own personal resources, and an anxiety to astound and enslave by means of his magnificence--to overwhelm his proud but dowerless bride with the almost fabulous profusion and splendor of his wealth? Perhaps there was, and the very magnificence which dazzled her was prompted more by meanness than generosity.

This time he came accompanied by a gentleman, the Sieur de Blassemare, who appeared pretty much what he actually was--a sort of general agent, adviser, companion, and hanger-on of the rich Fermier-General.

The Sieur de Blassemare had his _titres de noblesse_, and started in life with a fair fortune. This, however, he had seriously damaged by play, and was now obliged to have recourse to that species of dexterity, to support his luxuries, which, employed by others, had been the main agent in his own ruin. The millionaire and the parvenu found him invaluable. He was always gay, always in good humor; a man of birth and breeding, well accepted, in spite of his suspected rogueries, in the world of fashion--an adept in all its ways, as well as in the mysteries of human nature; active, inquisitive, profligate; the very man to pick up intelligence when it was needed--to execute a delicate commission, or to advise and assist in any project of taste. In addition to all these gifts and perfections, his fund of good spirits and scandalous anecdote was inexhaustible, and so Monsieur Le Prun conceived him very cheaply retained at the expense of allowing him to cheat him quietly of a few score of crowns at an occasional game of picquet.

This fashionable sharper and voluptuary was now somewhere about five-and-forty; but with the assistance of his dress, which was exquisite, and the mysteries of his toilet, which was artistic in a high degree, and above all, his gayety, which never failed him, he might easily have passed for at least six years younger.

It was the wish of the benevolent Monsieur Le Prun to set the Viscount quite straight in money matters; and as there still remained, like the electric residuum in a Leyden vial after the main shock has been discharged, some few little affairs not quite dissipated in the explosion of his fortunes, and which, before his reappearance even in the background of society, must be arranged, he employed his agile aid-de-camp, the Sieur de Blassemare, to fish out these claims and settle them.

It was not to be imagined that a young girl, perfectly conscious of her beauty, with a great deal of vanity and an immensity of ambition, could fail to be delighted at the magnificent presents with which her rich old lover had that day loaded her.

She spread them upon the counterpane of her bed, and when she was tired of admiring them, she covered herself with her treasures, hung the flashing necklace about her neck, and clasped her little wrists in the massive bracelets, stuck a pin here and a brooch there, and covered her fingers with sparkling jewels; and though she had no looking-glass larger than a playing-card in which to reflect her splendor, she yet could judge in her own mind very satisfactorily of the effect. Then, after she had floated about her room, and courtesied, and waved her hands to her heart's content, she again strewed the bed with these delightful, intoxicating jewels, which flashed actual fascination upon her gaze.

At that moment her gratitude effervesced, and she almost felt that, provided she were never to behold his face again, she could--_not love_, but _like_ Monsieur Le Prun very well; she half relented, she almost forgave him; she would have received with good-will, with thanks, and praises, anything and everything he pleased to give her, except his company.

Meanwhile the old Visconte, somewhat civilized and modernized by recent restorations, was walking slowly to and fro in the little bowling-green, side by side with Blassemare.

"Yes," he said, "with confidence I give my child into his hands. It is a great trust, Blassemare; but he is gifted with those qualities, which, more than wealth, conduce to married happiness. I confide in him a great trust, but I feel I risk no sacrifice."

A comic smile, which he could not suppress, illuminated the dark features of Blassemare, and he looked away as if studying the landscape until it subsided.

"He is the most disinterested and generous of men," resumed the old gentleman.

"_Ma foi_, so he is," rejoined his companion; "but Mademoiselle de Charrebourg happened to be precisely the person he needed; birth, beauty, simplicity--a rare alliance. You underrate the merits of Mademoiselle de Charrebourg. He makes no such presents to the Sisters of Charity."

"Pardon me, sir, I know her merits well; she is indeed a dutiful and dear child."

And the Visconte's eyes filled with moisture, for his heart was softened by her prosperity, involving, as it did, his own.

"And will make one of the handsomest as she will, no doubt, one of the most loving wives in France," said Blassemare, gravely.

"And he will make, or I am no prophet, an admirable husband," resumed the Visconte; "he has so much good feeling and so much----"

"So much money," suggested Blassemare, who was charmed at the Visconte's little hypocrisy; "ay, by my faith, that he has; and as to that little bit of scandal, those mysterious reports, you know," he added, with a malicious simplicity.

"Yes, I know," said the Visconte, shortly.

"All sheer fiction, my dear Visconte," continued Blassemare, with a shrug and a smile of disclaimer.

"Of course, of course," said the Visconte, peremptorily.

"It was talked about, you know," persisted his malicious companion, "about twenty years ago, but it is quite discredited now--scouted. You can't think how excellently our good friend the Fermier-General is established in society. But I need not tell you, for of course you satisfied yourself; the alliance on which I felicitate Le Prun proves it."

The Visconte made a sort of wincing smile and a bow. He saw that Blassemare was making a little scene out of his insincerities for his own private entertainment. But there is a sort of conventional hypocrisy which had become habitual to them both. It was like a pair of blacklegs cheating one another for practice with their eyes open. So Blassemare presented his snuff-box, and the Visconte, with equal _bonhomie_, took a pinch, and the game was kept up pleasantly between them.

Meanwhile Lucille, in her chamber, the window of which opened upon the bowling-green, caught a word or two of the conversation we have just sketched. What she heard was just sufficient to awaken the undefined but anxious train of ideas which had become connected with the image of Monsieur Le Prun. Something seemed all at once to sadden and quench the fire that blazed in her diamonds; they were disenchanted; her heart no longer danced in their light. With a heavy sigh she turned to the drawer where the charmed vial lay; she took it out; she weighed it in her hand.

"After all," she said, "it _is_ but a toy. Why should it trouble me? What harm _can_ be in it?"

She placed it among the golden store that lay spread upon her coverlet. But it would not assimilate with those ornaments; on the contrary, it looked only more quaint and queer, like a suspicious stranger among them. She hurriedly took it away, more dissatisfied, somehow, than ever. She inwardly felt that there was danger in it, but what could it be? what its purpose, significance, or power? Conjecture failed her. There it lay, harmless and pretty for the present, but pregnant with unknown mischief, like a painted egg, stolen from a serpent's nest, which time and temperature are sure to hatch at last.

The strangest circumstance about it was, that she could not make up her mind to part with or destroy it. It exercised over her the fascination of a guilty companionship. She hated but could not give it up. And yet, after all, what a trifle to fret the spirits even of a girl!

It is wonderful how rapidly impressions of pain or fear, if they be not renewed, lose their influence upon the conduct and even upon the spirits. The scene in the glen, the image of the unprepossessing and mysterious pythoness, and the substance and manner of the sinister warning she communicated, were indeed fixed in her memory ineffaceably. But every day that saw her marriage approach in security and peace, and her preparations proceed without molestation, served to dissipate her fears and to obliterate the force of that hated scene.

It was, therefore, only now and then that the odd and menacing occurrence recurred to her memory with a depressing and startling effect. At such moments, it might be of weakness, the boding words, "Don't marry him; if you do you shall see me again," smote upon her heart like the voice of a specter, and she felt that chill, succeeded by vague and gloomy anxiety, which superstition ascribes to the passing presence of a spirit from the grave.

"I don't think you are happy, dear Lucille, or may be you are offended with me," said Julie St. Pierre, turning her soft blue eyes full upon her handsome companion, and taking her hand timidly between her own.

They were sitting together on a wild bank, shaded by a screen of brushwood, in the park. Lucille had been silent, abstracted, and, as it seemed, almost sullen during their walk, and poor little timid Julie, who cherished for her girlish friend that sort of devotion with which gentler and perhaps better natures are so often inspired by firmer wills, and more fiery tempers, was grieved and perplexed.

"Tell me, Lucille, are you angry with me?"

"_I_ angry! no, indeed; and angry with you, my dear, _dear_ little friend! I could not be, dear Julie, even were I to try."

And so they kissed heartily again and again.

"Then," said Julie, sitting down by her, and taking her hand more firmly in hers, and looking with such a loving interest as nothing could resist in her face, "you are unhappy. Why don't you tell me what it is that grieves you? I dare say I could give you very wise counsel, and, at all events, console you. At the convent the pensioners used all to come to me when they were in trouble, and, I assure you, I always gave them good advice."

"But I am not unhappy."

"Really?"

"No, indeed."

"Well, shall I tell you? I thought you were unhappy because you are going to be married to my uncle."

"Folly, folly, my dear little prude. Your uncle is a very good man, and a very grand match. I ought to be delighted at a prospect so brilliant."

Even while Lucille spoke, she felt a powerful impulse to tell her little companion _all_--her fondness for Dubois, her aversion for Monsieur Le Prun, the scene with the strange woman, and her own forebodings; but such a confession would have been difficult to reconcile with her fixed resolution to let the affair take its course, and at all hazards marry the man whom, it was vain to disguise it from herself, she disliked, distrusted, and feared.

"I was going to give you comfort by my own story. I never told you before that _I_, too, am affianced."

"Affianced! and to whom?"

"To the Marquis de Secqville."

"Hey! Why that is the very gentleman of whom Monsieur de Blassemare told us such wicked stories the other day."

"Did he?" she said, with a sigh. "Well, I often feared he was a prodigal; but heaven, I trust, will reclaim him."

"But you do not love him?"

"No. I never saw him but once."

"And are you happy?"

"Yes, quite happy now; but, dear Lucille, I was very miserable once. You must know that shortly after we were betrothed, when I was placed in the convent at Rouen, there was a nice girl there, of whom I soon grew very fond. Her brother, Henri, used to come almost every day to see her. He was about three years older than I, and so brave and beautiful. I did not know that I loved him until his sister went away, and his visits, of course, ceased; and when I could not see him any more, I thought my heart would break."

"Poor little Julie!"

"I was afraid of being observed when I wept, but I used to cry to myself all night long, and wish to die, as my mother used to fear long ago I would do before I came to be as old as I am now; and I could not even hear of him, for my friend, his sister, had married, and was living near Caen, and so we were quite separated."

"You were, _indeed_, very miserable, my poor little friend."

"Yes; but at last, after a whole year, she was passing through Rouen, and so she came to the convent to see me. Oh, when I saw her my heart fluttered so that I thought I should have choked. I don't know why it was, but I was afraid to ask for him; but at last, finding she would not speak of him at all, which I thought was ill-natured, though indeed it was not, I _did_ succeed, and asked her how he was; then all at once she began to cry, for he was dead; and knowing _that_, I forgot everything--I lost sight of everything--they said I fainted. And when I awoke again there was a good many of the sisters and some of the pensioners round me, and my friend still weeping; and the superioress was there, too, but I did not heed them, but only said I would not believe he was dead. Then I was very ill for more than a month, and my uncle came to see me; but I don't think he knew what had made me so; and as soon as I grew better the superioress was very angry with me, and told me it was very wicked, which it may have been, but indeed I could not help it; and she gave me in charge to sister Eugenie to bring me to a sense of my sinfulness, seeing that I ought not to have loved any one but him to whom I was betrothed."

"Alas! poor Julie, I suppose she was a harsh preceptress also."

"No, indeed; on the contrary, she was very kind and gentle. She was so young--only twenty-three--dear sister Eugenie!--and so pretty, though she was very pale, and oh, so thin; and when we were both alone in her room she used to let me tell her all my story, and she used to draw her hand over her pretty face, and cry so bitterly in return, and kiss me, and shake me by the hands, that I often thought she must once have loved some one also herself, and was weeping because she could never see him again; so I grew to love her very much; but I did not know all that time that sister Eugenie was dying. The day I took leave of her she seemed as if she was going to tell me something about herself, and I think now if I had pressed her she would. I am very sorry I did not, for it would have been pleasant to me as long as I live to have given the dear sister any comfort, and shown how truly I loved her. But it was not so, and only four months after we parted she died; but I hope we may meet, where I am sure she is gone, in heaven, and then she will know how much I loved her, and how good, and gentle, and kind, I always thought her."

Poor little Julie shed tears at these words.

"Now I do not love the Marquis," she continued, "nor I am sure does he love me. It will be but a match of convenience. I suppose he will continue to follow his amusements and I will live quietly at home; so after all it will make but little change to me, and I will still be as I am now, the widow of poor Henri."

"You are so tranquil, dear Julie, because he is dead. Happy is it for you that he is in his grave. Come, let us return."

They began to walk toward the cottage.

"And how would you spend your days, Julie, had you the choice of your own way of life?"

"I would take the vail. I would like to be a nun, and to die early, like sister Eugenie."

Lucille looked at her with undisguised astonishment.

"Take the vail!" she exclaimed, "so young, so pretty. _Parbleu_, I would rather work in the fields or beg my bread on the high-roads. Take the vail--no, no, no. Marguerite told me I had a great-aunt who took the vail, and three years after died mad in a convent in Paris. Ah, it is a sad life, Julie, it is a sad life!"

It was the wish of the Fermier-General that his nuptials should be celebrated with as much privacy as possible. The reader, therefore, will lose nothing by our dismissing the ceremony as rapidly as may be. Let it suffice to say, that it _did_ take place, and to describe the arrangements with which it was immediately succeeded.

Though Monsieur Le Prun had become the purchaser of the Charrebourg estate, he did not choose to live upon it. About eight leagues from Paris he possessed a residence better suited to his tastes and plans. It was said to have once belonged to a scion of royalty, who had contrived it with a view to realizing upon earth a sort of Mahomedan paradise. Nothing indeed could have been better devised for luxury as well as seclusion. From some Romish legend attaching to its site, it had acquired the name of the Chateau des Anges, a title which unhappily did not harmonize with the traditions more directly connected with the building itself.

It was a very spacious structure, some of its apartments were even magnificent, and the entire fabric bore overpowering evidences, alike in its costly materials and finish, and in the details of its design, of the prodigal and voluptuous magnificence to which it owed its existence.

It was environed by lordly forests, circle within circle, which were pierced by long straight walks diverging from common centers, and almost losing themselves in the shadowy distance. Studded, too, with a series of interminable fishponds, encompassed by hedges of beech, yew, and evergreens of enormous height and impenetrable density, under whose emerald shadows water-fowl of all sorts, from the princely swan down to the humble water-hen, were sailing and gliding this way and that, like rival argosies upon the seas.

The view of the chateau itself, when at last, through those dense and extensive cinctures of sylvan scenery, you had penetrated to its site, was, from almost every point, picturesque and even beautiful.

Successive terraces of almost regal extent, from above whose marble balustrades and rows of urns the tufted green of rare and rich plants, in a long, gorgeous wreath of foliage, was peeping, ran, tier above tier, conducting the eye, among statues and graceful shrubs, to the gables and chimneys of the quaint but vast chateau itself. The forecourt upon which the great avenue debouched was large enough for the stately muster of a royal levee; and at intervals, upon the balustrade which surrounded it, were planted a long file of stone statues, each originally holding a lamp, which, however, the altered habits of the place had long since dismounted.

If the place had been specially contrived, as it was said to have been, for privacy, it could not have been better planned. It was literally buried in an umbrageous labyrinth of tufted forest. Even the great avenue commanded no view of the chateau, but abutted upon a fountain, backed by a towering screen of foliage, where the approach divided, and led by a double road to the court we have described. In fact, except from the domain itself, the very chimneys of the chateau were invisible for a circuit of miles around, the nearest point from which a glance of its roof could be caught being the heights situated a full league away.

If the truth must be told, then, Monsieur Le Prun was conscious of some disparity in point of years between himself and his beautiful wife; and although he affected the most joyous confidence upon the subject, he was nevertheless as ill at ease as most old fellows under similar circumstances. It soon became, therefore, perfectly plain, that the palace to which the wealthy bridegroom had transported his beautiful wife was, in truth, but one of those enchanted castles in which enamored genii in fairy legends are described as guarding their captive princesses--a gorgeous and luxurious prison, to which there was no access, from which no escape, and where amidst all the treasures and delights of a sensuous paradise, the captive beauty languished and saddened.

END OF PART I.

[From the Examiner.]

TO CHARLES DICKENS.

BY WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.

Call we for harp or song?
Accordant numbers, measured out, belong
Alone, we hear, to bard.
Let him this badge, for ages worn, discard;
Richer and nobler now
Than when the close-trimm'd laurel mark'd his brow,
And from one fount his thirst
Was slaked, and from none other proudly burst
Neighing, the winged steed.
Gloriously fresh were those young days indeed!
Clear, if confined, the view:
The feet of giants swept that early dew;
More graceful came behind,
And golden tresses waved upon the wind.

Pity and Love were seen
In earnest converse on the humble green;
Grief too was there, but Grief
Sat down with them, nor struggled from relief.
Strong Pity was, strong he,
But little love was bravest of the three.
At what the sad one said
Often he smiled, though Pity shook her head.
Descending from their clouds,
The Muses mingled with admiring crowds:
Each had her ear inclined,
Each caught and spoke the language of mankind
From choral thraldom free...
Dickens! didst thou teach _them_, or they teach _thee_?

_September, 1850._

[From "Light and Darkness," by Catharine Crowe, Author of "The Night Side of Nature," &c. &c.]

THE TWO MISS SMITHS.

In a certain town in the West of England, which shall be nameless, there dwelt two maiden ladies of the name of Smith; each possessing a small independence, each residing, with a single maid-servant, in a small house, the drawing-room floor of which was let, whenever lodgers could be found; each hovering somewhere about the age of fifty, and each hating the other with a restless and implacable enmity. The origin of this aversion was the similarity of their names; each was Miss C. Smith, the one being called Cecilia, the other Charlotte--a circumstance which gave rise to such innumerable mistakes and misunderstandings, as were sufficient to maintain these ladies in a constant state of irritability and warfare. Letters, messages, invitations, parcels, bills, were daily missent, and opened by the wrong person; thus exposing the private affairs of one to the other; and as their aversion had long ago extinguished everything like delicacy on either side, any information so acquired was used without scruple to their mutual annoyance. Presents, too, of fruit, vegetables, or other delicacies from the neighboring gentry, not unfrequently found their way to the wrong house; and if unaccompanied by a letter, which took away all excuse for mistake, they were appropriated without remorse, even when the appropriating party felt confident in her heart that the article was not intended for her; and this not from greediness or rapacity, but from the absolute delight they took in vexing each other.

It must be admitted, also, that this well-known enmity was occasionally played upon by the frolic-loving part of the community, both high and low; so that over and above the genuine mistakes, which were of themselves quite enough to keep the poor ladies in hot water, every now and then some little hoax was got up and practiced upon them, such as fictitious love-letters, anonymous communications, and so forth. It might have been imagined, as they were not answerable for their names, and as they were mutual sufferers by the similarity--one having as much right to complain of this freak of fortune as the other, that they might have entered into a compact of forbearance, which would have been equally advantageous to either party; but their naturally acrimonious dispositions prevented this, and each continued as angry with the other as she could have been if she had a sole and indefeasible right to the appellation of _C. Smith_, and her rival had usurped it in a pure spirit of annoyance and opposition. To be quite just, however, we must observe that Miss Cecilia was much the worse of the two; by judicious management Miss Charlotte might have been tamed, but the malice of Miss Cecilia was altogether inexorable.

By the passing of the Reform Bill, the little town wherein dwelt these belligerent powers received a very considerable accession of importance; it was elevated into a borough, and had a whole live member to itself, which, with infinite pride and gratification, it sent to parliament, after having extracted from him all manner of pledges, and loaded him with all manner of instructions as to how he should conduct himself under every conceivable circumstance; not to mention a variety of bills for the improvement of the roads and markets, the erection of a town-hall, and the reform of the systems of watching, paving, lighting, &c., the important and consequential little town of B----.

A short time previous to the first election--an event which was anticipated by the inhabitants with the most vivid interest--one of the candidates, a country gentleman who resided some twenty miles off, took a lodging in the town, and came there with his wife and family, in order, by a little courtesy and a few entertainments, to win the hearts of the electors and their friends; and his first move was to send out invitations for a tea and card party, which, in due time, when the preparations were completed, was to be followed by a ball. There was but one milliner and dressmaker of any consideration in the town of B----, and it may be imagined that on so splendid an occasion her services were in great request--so much so, that in the matter of head-dresses, she not only found that it would be impossible, in so short a period, to fulfill the commands of her customers, but also that she had neither the material nor the skill to give them satisfaction. It was, therefore, settled that she should send off an order to a house in Exeter, which was the county town, for a cargo of caps, toquets, turbans, &c., fit for all ages and faces--"such as were not disposed of to be returned;" and the ladies consented to wait, with the best patience they could, for this interesting consignment, which was to arrive, without fail, on the Wednesday, Thursday being the day fixed for the party. But the last coach arrived on Wednesday night without the expected boxes; however, the coachman brought a message for Miss Gibbs, the milliner, assuring her that they would be there the next morning without fail.

Accordingly, when the first Exeter coach rattled through the little street of B----, which was about half-past eleven, every head that was interested in the freight was to be seen looking anxiously out for the deal boxes; and, sure enough, there they were--three of them--large enough to contain caps for the whole town. Then there was a rush up stairs for their bonnets and shawls; and in a few minutes troops of ladies, young and old, were seen hurrying toward the market-place, where dwelt Miss Gibbs--the young in pursuit of artificial flowers, gold bands, and such like adornments--the elderly in search of a more mature order of decoration.

Amongst the candidates for finery, nobody was more eager than the two Miss Smiths; and they had reason to be so, not only because they had neither of them anything at all fit to be worn at Mrs. Hanaway's party, which was in a style much above the entertainments they were usually invited to, but also because they both invariably wore turbans, and each was afraid that the other might carry off the identical turban that might be most desirable for herself. Urged by this feeling, so alert were they, that they were each standing at their several windows when the coach passed, with their bonnets and cloaks actually on--ready to start for the plate!--determined to reach Miss Gibbs's in time to witness the opening of the boxes. But "who shall control his fate?" Just as Miss Cecilia was stepping off her threshold, she was accosted by a very gentlemanly looking person, who, taking off his hat, with an air really irresistible, begged to know if he had "the honor of seeing Miss Smith"--a question which was of course answered in the affirmative.

"I was not quite sure," said he, "whether I was right, for I had forgotten the number; but I thought it was sixty," and he looked at the figures on the door.

"This _is_ sixty, sir," said Miss Cecilia; adding to herself, "I wonder if it was sixteen he was sent to?" for at number sixteen lived Miss Charlotte.

"I was informed, madam," pursued the gentleman, "that I could be accommodated with apartments here--that you had a first floor to let."

"That is quite true, sir," replied Miss Cecilia, delighted to let her rooms, which had been some time vacant, and doubly gratified when the stranger added, "I come from Bath, and was recommended by a friend of yours, indeed probably a relation, as she bears the same name--Miss Joanna Smith."

"I know Miss Joanna very well, sir," replied Miss Cecilia; "pray, walk up stairs, and I'll show you the apartments directly. (For," thought she, "I must not let him go out of the house till he has taken them, for fear he should find out his mistake.) Very nice rooms, sir, you see--everything clean and comfortable--a pretty view of the canal in front--just between the baker's and the shoemaker's; you'll get a peep, sir, if you step to this window. Then it's uncommonly lively; the Exeter and Plymouth coaches, up and down, rattling through all day long, and indeed all night too, for the matter of that. A beautiful little bedroom, back, too, sir--Yes, as you observe, it certainly does look over a brick-kiln; but there's no dust--not the least in the world--for I never allow the windows to be opened: altogether, there can't be a pleasanter situation than it is."

The stranger, it must be owned, seemed less sensible of all these advantages than he ought to have been; however he engaged the apartments: it was but for a short time, as he had come there about some business connected with the election; and as Miss Joanna had so particularly recommended him to the lodging, he did not like to disoblige her. So the bargain was struck: the maid received orders to provision the garrison with bread, butter, tea, sugar, &c., whilst the gentleman returned to the inn to dispatch Boots with his portmanteau and carpet-bag.

"You were only just in time, sir," observed Miss Cecilia, as they descended the stairs, "for I expected a gentleman to call at twelve o'clock to-day, who, I am sure, would have taken the lodgings."

"I should be sorry to stand in the way," responded the stranger, who would not have been at all sorry for an opportunity of backing out of the bargain. "Perhaps you had better let him have them--I can easily get accommodated elsewhere."

"Oh dear, no, sir; dear me! I wouldn't do such a thing for the world!" exclaimed Miss Cecilia, who had only thrown out this little inuendo by way of binding her lodger to his bargain, lest, on discovering his mistake, he should think himself at liberty to annul the agreement. For well she knew that it _was_ a mistake: Miss Joanna of Bath was Miss Charlotte's first cousin, and, hating Miss Cecilia, as she was in duty bound to do, would rather have sent her a dose of arsenic than a lodger, any day. She had used every precaution to avoid the accident that had happened, by writing on a card, "Miss Charlotte Smith, No. 16, High street, B----, _opposite the linendrapers shop_," but the thoughtless traveler, never dreaming of the danger in which he stood, lost the card, and, trusting to his memory, fell into the snare.

Miss Cecilia had been so engrossed by her anxiety to hook this fish before her rival could have a chance of throwing out a bait for him, that, for a time, she actually forgot Miss Gibbs and the turban; but now that point was gained, and she felt sure of her man, her former care revived with all its force, and she hurried along the street toward the market-place, in a fever of apprehension lest she should be too late. The matter certainly looked ill; for, as she arrived breathless at the door, she saw groups of self-satisfied faces issuing from it, and, amongst the rest, the obnoxious Miss Charlotte's physiognomy appeared, looking more pleased than anybody.

"Odious creature!" thought Miss Cecilia; "as if she supposed that any turban in the world could make her look tolerable!" But Miss Charlotte did suppose it; and moreover she had just secured the very identical turban that of all the turbans that ever were made was most likely to accomplish this desideratum--at least so she opined.

Poor Miss Cecilia! Up stairs she rushed, bouncing into Miss Gibbs's little room, now strewed with finery. "Well, Miss Gibbs, I hope you have something that will suit me?"

"Dear me, mem," responded Miss Gibbs, "what a pity you did not come a little sooner. The only two turbans we had are just gone--Mrs. Gosling took one, and Miss Charlotte Smith the other--two of the beautifulest--here they are, indeed--you shall see them;" and she opened the boxes in which they were deposited, and presented them to the grieved eye of Miss Cecilia.

She stood aghast! The turbans were very respectable turbans indeed; but to her disappointed and eager desires they appeared worthy of Mahomet the Prophet, or the grand Sultana, or any other body, mortal or immortal, that has ever been reputed to wear turbans. And this consummation of perfection she had lost! lost just by a neck! missed it by an accident, that, however gratifying she had thought it at the time, she now felt was but an inadequate compensation for her present disappointment. But there was no remedy. Miss Gibbs had nothing fit to make a turban of; besides, Miss Cecilia would have scorned to appear in any turban that Miss Gibbs could have compiled, when her rival was to be adorned with a construction of such superhuman excellence. No! the only consolation she had was to scold Miss Gibbs for not having kept the turbans till she had seen them, and for not having sent for a greater number of turbans. To which objurgations Miss Gibbs could only answer: "That she had been extremely sorry indeed, when she saw the ladies were bent upon having the turbans, as she had ordered two entirely with a view to Miss Cecilia's accommodation; and moreover that she was never more surprised in her life than when Mrs. Gosling desired one of them might be sent to her, because Mrs. Gosling never wore turbans; and if Miss Gibbs had only foreseen that she would have pounced upon it in that way, she, Miss Gibbs, would have taken care she should never have seen it at all," &c., &c., &c.,--all of which the reader may believe, if he or she choose.

As for Miss Cecilia, she was implacable, and she flounced out of the house, and through the streets, to her own door, in a temper of mind that rendered it fortunate, as far as the peace of the town of B---- was concerned, that no accident brought her in contact with Miss Charlotte on the way.

As soon as she got into her parlor she threw off her bonnet and shawl, and plunging into her arm-chair, she tried to compose her mind sufficiently to take a calm view of the dilemma, and determine on what line of conduct to pursue--whether to send an excuse to Mrs. Hanaway, or whether to go to the party in one of her old head-dresses. Either alternative was insupportable. To lose the party, the game at loo, the distinction of being seen in such good society--it was too provoking; besides, very likely people would suppose she had not been invited; Miss Charlotte, she had no doubt, would try to make them believe so. But then, on the other hand, to wear one of her old turbans was so mortifying--they were so very shabby, so unfashionable--on an occasion, too, when everybody would be so well-dressed! Oh, it was aggravating--vexatious in the extreme! She passed the day in reflection--chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancies; recalling to herself how well she looked in the turban--for she had tried it on; figuring what would have been Miss Charlotte's mortification if she had been the disappointed person--how triumphantly she, Miss Cecilia, would have marched into the room with the turban on her head--how crestfallen the other would have looked; and then she varied her occupation by resuscitating all her old turbans, buried in antique band-boxes deep in dust, and trying whether it were possible, out of their united materials, to concoct one of the present fashionable shape and dimensions. But the thing was impracticable: the new turban was composed of crimson satin and gold lace, hers of pieces of muslin and gauze.

When the mind is very much engrossed, whether the subject of contemplation be pleasant or unpleasant, time flies with inconceivable rapidity; and Miss Cecilia was roused from her meditations by hearing the clock in the passage strike four, warning her that it was necessary to come to some decision, as the hour fixed for the party, according to the primitive customs of B----, was half-past seven, when the knell of the clock was followed by a single knock at the door, and the next moment her maid walked into the room with--what do you think?--the identical crimson and gold turban in her hand!

"What a beauty!" cried Susan, turning it round, that she might get a complete view of it in all its phases.

"Was there any message, Sue?" inquired Miss Cecilia, gasping with agitation, for her heart was in her throat.

"No, ma'am," replied Sue; "Miss Gibbs's girl just left it; she said it should have come earlier, but she had so many places to go to."

"And she's gone, is she, Susan?"

"Yes, ma'am, she went directly--she said she hadn't got half through yet."

"Very well, Susan, you may go; and remember, I'm not at home if anybody calls; and if any message comes here from Miss Gibbs, you'll say I'm gone out, and you don't expect me home till very late."

"Very well, ma'am."

"And I say, Susan, if they send here to make any inquiries about that turban, you'll say you know nothing about it, and send them away."

"Very well, ma'am," said Susan, and down she dived to the regions below.

Instead of four o'clock, how ardently did Miss Cecilia wish it was seven; for the danger of the next three hours was imminent. Well she understood how the turban had got there--it was a mistake of the girl--but the chance was great that, before seven o'clock arrived, Miss Charlotte would take fright at not receiving her head-dress, and would send to Miss Gibbs to demand it, when the whole thing would be found out. However no message came: at five o'clock, when the milk-boy rang, Miss Cecilia thought she should have fainted: but that was the only alarm. At six she began to dress, and at seven she stood before her glass in full array, with the turban on her head. She thought she had never looked so well; indeed, she was sure she had not. The magnitude of the thing gave her an air, and indeed a feeling of dignity and importance that she had never been sensible of before. The gold lace looked brilliant even by the light of her single tallow candle; what would it do in a well-illumined drawing-room! Then the color was strikingly becoming, and suited her hair exactly--Miss Cecilia, we must here observe, was quite gray; but she wore a frontlet of dark curls, and a little black silk skull-cap, fitted close to her head, which kept all neat and tight under the turban.

She had not far to go; nevertheless, she thought it would be as well to set off at once, for fear of accidents, even though she lingered on the way to fill up the time, for every moment the danger augmented; so she called to Susan to bring her cloak, and her calash, and her overalls, and being well packed up by the admiring Sue, who declared the turban was "without exception the beautifulest thing she ever saw," she started; determined, however, not to take the direct way, but to make a little circuit by a back street, lest, by ill luck, she should fall foul of the enemy.