Chapter IV: Part 4

Thus, separated from every object that might have had a near claim upon his heart, Ripperda gave up his soul to the commonwealth. He travelled throughout Europe, to study the characters and politics of its rulers, in the seats of their governments; and he returned with an extent of information which rendered his judgement on general policy, almost omniscient. His influence too, was not less far-reaching; for he never forgot the gracious courtesies of life, in the stern pursuits of the statesman.--In him was mingled a strange, but imposing union; the republican independence of a citizen of Holland, with the chivalric gallantry and feudal grandeur which distinguish the grandee of Spain.--His house was a palace; his retinue superb; and his table open every day to the first men in the States, and to all noble strangers who visited the country. His thoughts, his time, his fortune, all were dedicated to the Republic:--but he would bestow that all according to his own humour. Not by a covert, silent, channel; but openly, bounteously, magnificently; as he thought became him who made the dedication, and the great people by which it was accepted. With this profusion, he was no prodigal. His estates in Groningen and the adjacent provinces, were immense; but they were not his only means. His expansive genius had grasped the various resources of commerce; and the treasures which poured into him from every point of the compass, rendered his expenditure exhaustless. Thus absorbed in a wide-spreading vortex of public duties, which seemed by each successive movement to separate his thoughts still farther from domestic recollections, it is not surprising that he almost ceased to remember he was a father. Indeed the image of his absent son never presented itself, but when occasional letters arrived from Mr. Athelstone; and then the thought once or twice occurred to him to have Louis to Holland. The next public dispatch dissipated the idea; and it never crossed him again, till some other letter recalled the wish--to be as speedily forgotten. Meanwhile, the great events of Europe were operating an unlooked for change in the destiny of Baron de Ripperda.

When Louis the Fourteenth of France died, his descendant Philip the Fifth of Spain, felt himself released from a yoke in which there had been more of the despot than of the parent.--And, in consequence of certain political changes which he immediately proposed, the States-General found it necessary to confide their affairs at his court to some man of diplomatic genius, capable of coping with the mysterious policy of Alberoni, and the variety of talent possessed by the foreign ministers assembled at Madrid. Their universal suffrage named the Baron de Ripperda, and without demur he undertook the embassy.

During a long and complicated negociation at Madrid, he became the object of general interest and curiosity. His fine person, and exquisitely polished manners, were themes of amazement and admiration with the Queen and her ladies. Such graces of mien, and eloquence of discourse, could hardly be native or acquired by a Hollander!--But when it was understood that his father, and all his paternal ancestors were Spaniards, the enthusiasm of the Queen was excited to re-unite so much talent to the service of his original country. His favour with the royal Isabella was no trifling object of observation with the foreign ministers. But the jealousy which his acute penetration, and alert turns in diplomacy might have kept on the alarm, was beguiled of its vigilance by the suavity of his manners, and his talent of winning their confidence, while he gained his object. He knew how to wear his triumphs with discretion; for, content with victory, he never displayed its ensigns. Thus, he noiselessly pursued his diplomatic advantages, and had subdued the whole field, before his adversary even perceived his banner on the ground.--The object of his mission being obtained, he returned to Holland. The States-General received him with public testimonies of satisfaction:--but he found his former sway in their councils traversed by a number of new representatives, impatient of dictation, and jealous of his former supremacy in the state. Though he had brought in his hand a treaty, that proved his unswerving fidelity to Holland, these turbulent men affected to suspect he might hereafter be too well inclined to favour a country which had just invited him, with every maternal persuasion, to return to her bosom. Despising the juvenile demagogues who presumed to insinuate suspicions against his public faith; and indignant at the timidity of his colleagues, in suffering the utterance of such slanderous insults; he boldly declared, that the ingratitude of the States-General now determined him to re-unite himself to the land of his fathers.--"But," said he, "the unchecked obloquy of these novices, shall not provoke me to forget, when returned to my mother country, that Holland, until this disgraceful moment, was my affectionate nurse!"

Whilst disposing of his estates in Groningen, and turning the tide of his commercial affairs to the coasts of Spain, new revolutions were taking place in the political theatre of his future action.--Alberoni was dismissed the kingdom, in consequence of a trifling accident, which had the momentous effect of discovering all his long concerted plans to the eyes of alarmed Europe. A scheme was developed to aggrandize Spain at the expence of all other nations; and had not Philip sacrificed his too-daring minister to the indignation of the monarchs, he would have felt their resentment on every side of his kingdom. The cabinet of Madrid was in tumults; and the King and Queen, doubting to what hand they could safely commit the helm in so dangerous a storm. At this juncture, Ripperda returned; and was received with open arms. Besides his acquaintance with foreign courts, his eminent situation, some years before, at the congress of Utrecht, by bringing him into diplomatic contact with the most efficient statesmen of the different nations, had informed him so thoroughly of their individual characters, and general views for their respective countries, that he found no difficulty in presenting his now acknowledged sovereigns, with a chart by which they might navigate the vessel of the State out of the perilous track into which the adventurous Alberoni had plunged her.

All this was transacted in the private boudoir of Her Majesty. To the inconsiderate part of the world, Ripperda appeared to have strangely resigned himself to a life of mere amusement; for to the inconsiderate, all is what it seems. His fine person was excuse enough to them, for the high favour in which he stood with the Queen; for though no lip of slander had ever moved against her honour; all knew, that like the royal Elizabeth of England, she was fond of the attentions of handsome and accomplished men.

Ripperda purchased a villa near Segovia, and a superb mansion at Madrid. His household establishment and equipages were not less magnificent, than when he was one of the _merchant princes_ of Holland; and his table, in like manner was surrounded by the best company of Spain. The gayer part believed that his evening attendance at the _Buen Retiro_ was to play picquet with the Queen, or chess with His Majesty; but the graver sort were fully aware that, whoever were the ostensible ministers of Philip, Ripperda was the one in fact. They could trace to his suggestion, and covert execution, various changes in the constitution, to consolidate its power and augment its resources. Plans of commerce were devised and put into practice; and manufactures introduced at Segovia and Gaudalaxara, which threatened the staple trade of Great Britain. Considering the immediate instruments of national greatness to be wealth, and the power of defending it; he formed a design for rendering Cadiz one of the noblest ports in the world; and to establish around the coast, docks and arsenals, and every other means of constructing a formidable navy. This was the internal policy of Spain, under the secret influence of the Baron de Ripperda. With Alberoni's dismission, its external measures also took a new aspect; and with regard to the disputed accession in England, seemed meditating a change. A few years ago Philip had assisted the chevalier Saint George in his descent on Scotland; but he now resisted all applications to the same effect; and openly professed a growing respect for the house of Hanover. Notwithstanding similar repulses from the French minister, the irrepressible hopes of James Stuart were kept on the alert by repeated assurances from his partizans in England; that a schism in the parliament had aroused corresponding jealousies amongst the people, which were daily expected to break out into an insurrection, not likely to be quelled by a king and an heir-apparent avowedly hostile to each other.

"At so critical a juncture, as the cabinet of St. Germain's supposed this to be;" observed the Pastor, "it is not surprising that Duke Wharton should grasp at any means of averting the absolute secession of Spain from his master's cause. He is aware of the Baron de Ripperda's power with King Philip: and by seeking to involve the son in a project for a second rebellion, he hopes to engage the father's pride or his fears, in the same adventure."

The mind of Louis was powerfully excited during a discourse which embraced so many topics; and all connected with himself, by means of a father, who he knew by fame only; but such a fame as filled his son with an admiration, only to be equalled by the emulation which broke at once over his heart. While listening to the enumeration of his father's patriotic acts for Holland and for Spain; he contemned the airy pretensions of every brilliant, but inferior aim to celebrity: all but substantial worthiness vanished before him, like the bursting of light upon darkness. He had heard of his father; but now he seemed to feel his presence: and he sat with his hands clasped, absorbed in the immensity of the subject.

Mr. Athelstone observed the workings of his countenance; the flashing brightness of his complexion, as his thoughts darted from Lindisfarne to Holland, and from Holland to Spain. He had not heard his uncle's last observation with regard to Wharton's views on his father and himself. Mr. Athelstone understood the abstraction of his mind. He was too well read in the human character not to guess what was passing there. He gazed on him a few minutes in silence; contemplating with the anxiety of parental affection what might be the issue of the passion he saw was then conceived in that ingenuous and ardent soul.

"But it must not be for treason!" cried he to himself, and gently shaking the arm of his nephew, he repeated his last remark on the Duke. He perceived by the start Louis gave, in recalling his diverged faculties, that he was now attended to; and for a while he pursued the subject with other observations. At the conclusion, he added in a solemn voice, "you know, my child, I require no reply to this head of my discourse. But I beseech you, weigh well the true nature of things before you act. In no case allow imagination to mislead you. To be on the suffering side of a contest, is generally sufficient, in the judgment of generous youth, to make it the just one. And it is a beneficent disposition of nature, to prompt man to the immediate succour of distress. Oh, that our judges would consider this, in causes of rebellion, before they condemn the young enthusiast, who would as readily raise his arm for exiled Brunswick, as for banished Stuart! It is the circumstance that draws the sword of unreflecting youth; thought and principle unsheath that of age; and their trial and sentence should be accordingly. But let not such reflections be your apology, Louis! Another time I will give you the experience of my seventy years, by a full explanation of why England changed the nature of her ruler; and then if you err," added he with a melancholy smile, "it will be against knowledge, and not even my partial indulgence can excuse you."

He rose as he spoke, and pressing the hand on which his nephew was thoughtfully leaning his head, the worthy Pastor left him to meditate on what had passed.

CHAP. VII.

Mrs. Coningsby found the Marquis and his son seated amongst some pine-clad rocks on the southern side of the Parsonage. She made an apology for the length of her absence, and the continuation of Mr. Athelstone's, by relating to his Lordship much of what her nephew had communicated.

Meanwhile, Cornelia and her sister had joined Ferdinand, and sat with him in a recess of the cliff which fronted the sea. Its genial airs, warm from the south, suggested the more balmy ones of Italy and Spain, to the imagination of Alice, and she soon saw all vestiges of gloom pass from the brow of the young Spaniard, as with encreasing animation he answered her various questions on the subject of his travels and of his country. Cornelia enquired about the remains of ancient Rome, the eruptions of Vesuvius, and who, amongst the celebrated living characters of Italy and France, he personally knew. Alice paid little attention to his replies on these subjects, but made him describe the gardens of Naples, and the luxuriant landscapes which double their beauties in the translucent waters of its bay. She then talked of the orange groves of his own country; and asked whether it were true the Spanish ladies reposed every day after dinner by the sides of fountains, under the shade of these delicious arbours. He listened to her questions with delight. It was the ingenuous curiosity of fifteen, seeking information with the confidence of innocence; and he answered her with a minuteness, that shewed his pleasure in dwelling on themes congenial to her taste.

Cornelia perceived that the share she wished to take in the discourse, was almost wholly disregarded; but pleased to see their guest restored to good humour, and Alice interested in such improving conversation; she cheerfully moved towards her mother and the Marquis, and soon became wholly absorbed in their discussions.

The dinner-hour of the Parsonage once more assembled its family and guests around the social board. Peace had resumed her sway in every breast. The voice of unconscious tenderness had soothed the jealous irritability of Ferdinand, and his smiles diffused a complacency over the seriousness of his father, that harmonized with the beneficent serenity of their host. Mrs. Coningsby discoursed with the energy of an imagination whose first fires still glowed in their embers. The equable Cornelia looked around with satisfaction on the general cheerfulness, while Alice, whatever might be her volatile changes of place, always found herself settle by the side of the entertaining Spaniard. Gay as joy itself, and vibrating in every nerve the happiness she bestowed, she sported, like the young halcyon on waves of sunshine.

Louis was not less animated. His heart no longer upbraided him; and in his own element of blameless enjoyment, with unchecked delight his eyes followed the movements of Alice, as Ferdinand instructed her emulous curiosity in the native dances of his country. The young Spaniard seemed to have passed through the cave of Trophonius, so completely was he transformed from the reserved, frigid being of the morning. His late sallow complexion now flashed with the tints of health, and the vivacity of his conversation almost obliterated from Cornelia's remembrance the moody wretch who had rushed from her presence only a few hours before. Alice hovered round him, like one of the zephyrs which fanned their evening festivity; and at her desire he took her mother's lute, and played and sung to it several Spanish ditties. He reclined on a low sofa, beneath the open ivied-window, through whose Gothic interlacing the breeze entered, with the soft light of the stars. The tender melancholy of the airs shed a similar influence on the spirits of the youthful party; and while they listened with pensive delight to the last stanza of a plaintive seguedilla, the church clock struck twelve.

From the distant quarter of the room where Mrs. Coningsby sat with her uncle and the Marquis, she had observed the amusements on the opposite side. On hearing the hour strike, she rose from her chair, and telling the young people, it was not merely the _witching time of night_, but that the sabbath morning was begun; she broke up their revels, and dismissed them to their pillows.

Cornelia alone found uninterrupted slumber; Ferdinand did not sleep that night; Alice wondered why she did not close her eyes; and Louis lay meditating on the last four-and-twenty hours, till day dawned, and wearied nature sank into repose.

The morning brought him a letter before he had quitted his bed. Its seal was Wharton's _manche_ and _ducal coronet_. Louis held it some time unopened in his hand. What new contention might it demand of him? Was it to upbraid him for his flight? or was it an apology from the Duke for his attempt to detain him? Whatever were its errand, the sight of the letter recalled to him all the fascinations of its writer; and with trepidation he broke the seal. His heart clung to every line, while that of the volatile writer seemed winged, and lightly skimming the surface he professed to dwell on. The latter ran thus,

"_Et hi Brute!_ was a mighty dextrous Parthian bolt, but it whistled away, I know not whither. Would Cæsar have been so bad a marksman, as not to have distinguished his own Anthony from the wretch who played the brute part in the capitol? Why, de Montemar you are as much like the lantern-jawed Cassius, as I to that nose-led Stoic! You are too profound in canonization not to have read of a certain saint, no matter his name, who, with a pair of convenient red-hot pincers, clutched the devil by his feature of honour, and so dragged him roaring round the world. Cassius was no saint, whatever he might be of a conjuror; but I never hear your king-killing demagogues vaunting of their _prince of patriots_, without seeing the pincers at his nose. So, prithee, my dainty Cæsar, no more misnomers if you would not have me requite you in kind!

"And so, you even took the flood! I would not for happier hours, than even those your stubbornness wrested from me, I would not have lost that proof of your substance. You know I am _a being of vapour_! People who say so, must not wonder that I should be glad to play the atmosphere round something worth my while. Louis! had you not believed them, would you have fled me like a pestilence?

"Being of a gentle nature, as full of ruth as perhaps I ought to be of ruefulness, I will not bristle the grey locks of your venerable uncle this Saturday night, by likening him to any old woman on earth or in heaven. But I have a shrewd guess, that like the good lady Calphurnia, he pretends to dream; and on the evidence of such whimsies will report you my orisons!

----Pulchra Laverna,
Da mihi fallere, da justum sanctumque videri.

--Oh, wizards, how little do you know the mettle of Philip Wharton!--In the face of day, and of these darkling augurs, I avow that it is my object to make you my own! My true spirit, wearied with the tricks of men, and their sordid chemistry,

Delights to quaff the yet untasted spring,
And pluck the virgin flower!

"Is there a cloak over this dagger, my panic-struck Cæsar?

"However, that there may be no more alarms in. Saint Cuthbert's sanctuary, tell the holy man I have met Romulus's fate. If you look for me to-night it must be amongst the stars; for, after this is dispatched, neither Bamborough nor England, will hold your faithful.

"Bamborough Castle, Saturday night."

"Gone!" cried Louis, pressing the letter between his folded hands, "neither Bamborough nor England now holds its noble writer!" He turned towards the window, which commanded a view of the sea. The distant waves were sparkling beneath the beams of the morning sun: "beyond those he is sailing away, far from dark suspicion, and ungrateful de Montemar.--Ah, if he, indeed, knew I had so readily imbibed my uncle's belief, that he is deceitful, and seeking to betray me in the dearest interests of man!--would he thus subscribe himself my _Faithful_?--Does he not, by that single word, avow his trust in my honour, and his own disinterested attachment to me?"

Again he read the letter; it contained nothing which he might not shew to Mr. Athelstone. There was not a word in it, excepting the declaration of reciprocal fidelity in that of the signature, which implied a confidence; or even hinted at the preservation of his secret; and this implicit trust still more affected Louis.--"Noble Wharton!" cried he, "this is Alexander drinking the suspected bowl!--and you shall find that I am faithful."

He sprang out of bed, and hastily dressed himself. But just as he was hurrying out of the door with the letter in his hand, he paused.--"Why should I be thus eager to put myself into purgatory?"--He returned into the room.--"My dear, good, but precise uncle," continued he, "cannot understand this man! He will find an argument to blame all that I admire in this open, daring spirit. But at least, he must acknowledge that here he is no hypocritical designer! I will shew it to him."

Louis continued to fluctuate amidst a variety of reflections and resolutions, till the bell for family morning prayers roused him from his indecisive meditations; and putting the letter in his breast, he descended to the library.

When the duty was done, and he arose from his knees, he found the young Spaniard by his side; and rising from the same posture, which he had taken between him and Alice. Louis looked surprised: Ferdinand smiled; and without waiting to be questioned, said, that the preceding night he had enquired of Miss Coningsby what was meant by the vesper and matin bell, which rang after he and his father had withdrawn to rest, and before they appeared in the morning. She was so good as to explain it to him; and he had thus taken the liberty to join the family devotion. While the domestics were making their reverential bows to the Pastor as they retired, Mrs. Coningsby observed her young guest. She expressed her pleasure at meeting him in so sacred an hour; "but you are not of the church of Calvin or of Luther?" asked she.

"No," replied he, "but I am of the church of their master. And that, I trust, does not exclude me from yours!"

"That plea will open the gates of Heaven to you!" cried the Pastor with a benign smile, as he passed from the reading-desk into the breakfast-room.

It was some time before the Marquis came from his chamber; but when he did join the morning group, being ignorant of his son having mingled in what he would have deemed an heretical rite, he contemplated that son's renovated appearance with comfort unalloyed. He could not account to himself how such a change from weakness to activity; from despairing melancholy to gay cheerfulness; could have been wrought in the short space of two days; unless he might attribute it to the influence of the Saint, before whose defaced shrine he had knelt the preceding day, when he wandered alone to the solitary abbey. While he sat absorbed in these thoughts, Mrs. Coningsby mentioned to the younger part of the circle what had been discussed the evening before between herself and Mr. Athelstone.

As the season approached when she and her family usually emigrated to Morewick-hall, she now proposed going earlier; and that the Marquis and his son, accompanied by her nephew, should make a tour with herself and her daughters to the interesting scenery in the neighbourhood. "You will find the Hall more befitting your reception than this lonely rock," continued she, addressing the Marquis; "but Lindisfarne is my uncle's Patmos; and when here, he loves to live like a hermit in his cell."

"Rather," returned Ferdinand, with an answering smile: "like the privileged saint, emparadised with angels!"

Louis guessed that one view in this scheme, was to take him out of the way of the Duke; and with something between a sigh and a smile, in thinking the precaution was no longer necessary; he warmly seconded his aunt's proposal. The eyes of Alice and of Ferdinand met in pleased sympathy. And Cornelia, addressing the Marquis, soon awakened an interest, in him, he did not expect to find in the projected excursion. She talked to him of Alnwick, of its chivalrous trophies; and of the stone chair of Hotspur, which still overlooks its battlements. She then passed to the Castle of Warkworth: and spoke of the anchorite's chapel, dug in the heart of its rock. As she discoursed of the hero of Halidown; and narrated the sorrows of his friend, the devout penitent of the hermitage, her share of the Percy blood glowed on her cheek and in her language: and the Marquis, aroused to all his military and religious enthusiasm, often grasped the cross of his sword, and mingled a prayer with the aspirations of a soldier.

Meanwhile Alice enumerated to Ferdinand, the charming variety of their walks at Morewick; particularly along the meandering banks of the Coquet, and in view of the very hermitage Cornelia was describing to his father. Ferdinand accepted with delight her promise of conducting him to the cell by her own favourite path; over a little rustic bridge that joined the Morewick-grounds to an old romantic mill, which stood on an island embowered in trees, and dashed the foaming waters of its wheels through the pendant branches which swept the surface of the water. A boat, paddled by the miller's son, would convey them, under as deep a shade, to the opposite shore; and then, by a winding walk, traced in the wild wooded scenery by the hand of the hermit himself, she would lead him over the rocky heights to the cell; where for sixty years the mourning lover of murdered beauty had fed upon his tears day and night! "I know the pleasure with which Louis will accompany us;" added she, "and if it be moon-light he will like it better, for he often tells me, the garish hour of sunshine is no time for visiting the hermitage of Warkworth."

Louis did not hear what was passing, for he had chosen the opportunity of his uncle's guests being engaged in conversation with his cousins, to inform Mr. Athelstone that Duke Wharton had left Bamborough. When the good old man had read the Duke's letter, he pressed his nephew's hand as he returned it, and said with a playful smile, "It is well, and we will not grudge him his apotheosis!"

The remainder of the sabbath passed in the Pastor's family, as became the purity of its master's faith, and the simplicity of his manners. At the usual hours for the public celebration of divine worship, he and his little household, all excepting his Roman Catholic guests, repaired to the parish church.

Towards the close of the afternoon service, (while the Marquis had again absented himself, and was retired to the interior ruins of the abbey;) Ferdinand placed himself at the window of his bed-chamber, which commanded a view of the church-path, to watch the re-appearance of the only saint which now engaged his idolatry. With what pleasureable curiosity, excited by his sentiments for Alice, which gave him an interest in all that concerned her, did he see the massy oaken doors unfold from under the low Saxon arch, and the island train issue forth in their clean but coarse Sunday attire! Four generations in one family, first met his eye. A hale old fisherman, with grizzled locks and a ruddy though weather-ploughed cheek, supported on his sinewy arm the decent steps of his dame; who, dressed in a camlet gown of her own spinning and a linen apron and cap of spotless white, looked smilingly behind on the group that closely followed:--Her athletic son, and his comely wife; each restraining the capering steps of a chubby boy and girl, as they led them forth from the house of God. The aged patriarch of the race, his head whitened by the winters of nearly a century, closed the procession; leaning one hand on a staff, and the other on the arm of his youngest grandchild; a pretty young woman, whose down-cast eyes shewed how cautiously she was guiding the faultering steps of her venerable grand sire.--Of such simple and sincere worshippers was the congregation of Lindisfarne; and as Ferdinand observed their composed and happy countenances, he felt that their's must be the religion of peace.

"Yes;" cried he, "where innocence dwells, there must be genuine piety. Nothing is there to impede the free communion between earth and heaven. The blameless spirit does not fear to lift up its eyes in the presence of its Creator: it is still clothed in the brightness of His beams. But the guilty wretch--polluted--bereft!--Oh, what can hide his nakedness from the Omniscient eye?--Not the unction of man.--I have had enough of that.--What breath of mortal absolution can still this raging fire!" He smote his breast as he spoke, and tore himself from the window.

Mrs. Coningsby and her daughters had prepared tea in the drawing-room a long time before the different members of her little circle drew their chairs around it. The Pastor was paying his customary sabbath visitations to the infirm from age, sickness, or sorrow. Ferdinand was yet in his chamber; struggling with an agony of soul, more grievous than penance that priest ever inflicted. And Louis, having accompanied his uncle to the door of one of the fisher's huts, instead of returning home, walked on unconsciously, till he found himself in the cemetery of the old monastery, and saw the Marquis approaching him from the western aisle.

Supposing his Lordship had come there, merely as an admirer of antiquity, Louis did not hesitate to join him; and entering into conversation on this idea, he began to point out the most perfect specimens of its ancient architecture; and to name the periods of British history which they commemorated, as the times of the abbey's erection, enlargement, or repairing. As he was master of his subject; and spoke of its early founders, Oswald and Aidan, with not merely historical accuracy, but reverence for their holy zeal; Santa Cruz pressed the hand of his young companion; and attended with questioning complacency, till he almost forgot he was not listening to a good Catholic. He could not comprehend how a disciple of heresy, could have more toleration for the professors of the Roman creed, than he had for heretical infidelity; and therefore, with a hope that the Catholic Faith, which Baron de Ripperda had abjured, was latent in his son, the Marquis willingly gave way to the predilection he had conceived for him; and strolled with him over the whole ruin. After having been ascertained of the place where rested the mortal part of the exemplary Saint Aidan; he again bowed to the vacant spot, at the right side of the high altar, which had once contained the stone shrine of the holy Cuthbert.--Louis conducted him to a cell, now choaked with docks and nettles, which had once been the penitentiary of a King. Near this half-buried vault, lay several flat crosiered tomb-stones of different dates; and amongst them were two mitred brothers of the Barons of Athelstone and of Bamborough.

"You are nobly descended, Mr. de Montemar!" observed the Marquis; "By your mother's side from these powerful Northumbrian Barons.--By your father's, from the princely house of Nassau, and the more illustrious Ripperda of Andalusia. These were all faithful sons of the cross!--but now that their posterity have embraced the schisms of infidelity--oh, my ingenuous young friend, are you not at this moment ready to exclaim, _How am I fallen!_"

"No, my Lord," returned Louis, "I have too British a spirit, to regret the feudal power which was founded on the vassalage of my fellow-creatures,--and though my father may have forfeited all claim to the restitution of his paternal rights in Spain, by having become a proselyte to the religion in which I have been educated; I cannot deem any depression of rank a debasement, which is incurred in so sacred a cause."

Santa Cruz drew his arm from his companion. Such adherence to principle, had it been on his side of the argument, would have filled the Marquis with admiration; but in the present case, it gave his growing partiality for the son of Ripperda, so severe a shock, that he sunk into stern silence and turned out of the abbey. Not a word was spoken during their walk homeward. And when they entered the Parsonage, the Marquis bowed coldly to the Pastor; while, with a similar air of reserve, he accepted the seat presented to him by the side of Mrs. Coningsby.

The whole party were now assembled; but an embarrassing gravity pervaded them all. None knew exactly how to explain it; but it arose, rather from the several individuals thinking too intensely of each other, than from indifference to each other's society. Louis alone had straying thoughts; and they were wandering far and wide:--sometimes with his noble friend, throwing himself in loyal gallantry at the feet of a dethroned Queen and her Son. Then the image of his father, and of Spain, would occupy his mind. He seemed to be present with him in that country; where, though denied the honours of his race, the fame of his services proclaimed that he did more than possess them--he deserved them!--"I am not fallen;" said Louis to himself; "when sprung from such a father! What is there in mere title or station, to render a man truly great?--It is action, that makes the post, that of honour, or disgrace.--And, God of my fathers! give me but the opportunity to serve my country; and no man shall say the name of Ripperda has suffered degradation!"

Louis started from his chair, in the fulness of his emotion, and hastily crossed the room. He chanced to take the direction to a recess between the book-case and the porcelain cabinet.

"You are right to remind Cornelia of her duty," cried the Pastor, "open the door; and she will then recollect, that nearly an hour has elapsed since she ought to have given us our Sunday's evening anthem."

Louis immediately threw open a pair of small folding-doors, and discovered an organ, with the oratorios of Handel on its music-stand. Cornelia did not require a second reminder.--She took her seat before the instrument; and with tones that might--

"Create a soul under the ribs of death,"

sang the divine strains of "_I know that my Redeemer liveth_."

As the pealing organ swelled the note of praise, the Marquis almost imagined himself in his own oratory; and that he heard the seraphic voice of his daughter Marcella, chaunting her evening hymn to the Virgin. Tears Filled the father's eyes; he drew near the instrument; and crossing his arms over his breast, with the silent responses of the heart, he re-echoed every word and every note of the holy song. When Cornelia struck its last triumphant chords, and was rising from her seat, he entreated her to prolong strains so well suited to the vesper-hour, and the feelings with which he listened.

Mr. Athelstone joined in the request; remarking, that as he loved a peculiar consecration of the instruments of worship, he never permitted this organ to be opened but on the seventh-day, or other holy festivals; and, that when it was once touched by his Saint Cecilia, his greatest pleasure was to hear its sounds, till the hour of night closed them in prayer. Cornelia re-commenced, with the overture of the Messiah; and the evening ended in unison with the piety of her uncle and his guest: in hymns to the great Author of universal harmony.

CHAP. VIII.

The morning of the 1st of October, if it were piercing as a flight of arrows, was as dazzling too; for the clearness of the atmosphere gave an unusual splendour to every object: and the larks that carrolled high in the heavens, seemed exulting in the brilliancy of their course. The exhilarating property of the air had its effect upon the party from the Parsonage; who gaily stepped into the boat that was to convey them to a creek on the opposite shore, a little below Bamborough. To touch at the castle was out of the question; for no second flag of amnesty had yet passed between the angry baronet and his quietly expectant nephew.

On landing, they found horses which the Pastor had sent forward at dawn; and mounting, in full confidence of the animals being accustomed to the rough roads in prospect, the happy groupe commenced the day's excursion. Nearly a week's sojourn in the island had blunted most of the Marquis's prejudices against the amiable followers of Luther whom he found there; and the familiar companionship of minds not essentially discordant, had mingled them all into an intimacy almost amounting to friendship.

They proceeded along the classic banks of the Tweed, and the romantic borders of the Till, to the distant towers of royal Norham. Much food was there, for memory and meditation. The friends wandered for several hours amongst its legendary ruins; and then pursued the _debateable_ stream to Flodden Field. They found another train of thought on that solitary track. Two centuries before, it had borne the bannered host of two brother nations; and now lay a desert, as if curst by the kindred blood then spilt upon its soil.

Having treated the Marquis with a rustic dinner at a farm-house in the pretty village of Branxton, which stands a little to the north of the memorable field, Mrs. Coningsby and her highly-gratified party re-embarked at the mouth of the Tweed. Before them lay a magnificent setting sun. As the little bark tracked its way through a flood of molten gold, Ferdinand leaned behind the bench that supported Alice, and in a soft under-tone pursued the subjects which seemed most congenial to her youthful taste. Cornelia reclined near them, contemplating the receding shore, but listening to the Marquis; who sat between Louis and her mother, comparing with them the strange coincidence in the fates of James the Fourth of Scotland, Sebastian of Portugal, and Roderick of Spain; all of whose deaths were as doubtful, as their disappearance was certain, in the fields of battle where each lost his crown and existence to the world.

In these discourses time passed lightly, till the breeze wafted them, under the rising moon, into the sheltered cove of Lindisfarne.

On entering the Parsonage, Mr. Athelstone presented a packet to the Marquis; and its contents put to flight all their ready plans for future rambles. It had been forwarded through Holland by Baron Heinsius, and contained dispatches from Spain. They conveyed the royal Philip's orders to the Marquis Santa Cruz, to repair immediately to Madrid; where he was required to take his seat in the council on an affair of importance.

Ferdinand turned pale at this intelligence.

"Oh, that your Lordship would take me with you!" exclaimed Louis, impetuously. Mr. Athelstone interrupted him with a look. "Pardon me, Sir," cried he, "but my father,--am I never to see my father?" "When he wishes to see you. But you must not break upon his presence."

Louis said no more, but bowing to his uncle, with his heart full, hurried out of the room. The Marquis looked after him in silence.

Ferdinand had turned his despairing eyes on Alice, and saw her head bent on her bosom, with tears trickling down her cheeks. Those tears acted on his soul like dew on the parched earth, and, unconscious of the intention, he found himself at her side; he had taken her hand, he had murmured some indistinct sounds in her ear; but they suffused her face with blushes, and confused and agitated she withdrew her hand, and glided out of sight to a seat behind the window curtain. Ferdinand followed her with his eyes; but while he exultingly felt that her pure image possessed him wholly, he shrunk from the recollection of how unworthy his transgressions had made him of aspiring to the possession of so spotless a being. Nay, were it possible that penitence could so wash his stains away, as to restore him to the self-respect which is indispensible to the manly character, and above all to the consciousness of him who takes upon himself to be the protector and the happiness of a virtuous woman; was he not aware that even this blessed regeneration could not avail him here? He well knew that his father's bigotry would sooner see him die than allow him to perish, soul and body; which he would suppose must be the consequence, should he permit him to marry a daughter of the church of England. To acknowledge his sentiments for Alice to the Marquis, was only to call down his malediction on their object. And, under these circumstances, to reveal more of them to herself, than his surprised heart had already betrayed, seemed to him a base sacrifice to his own immediate gratification, at the expence of his honour and her future comfort. He was not so illread in female character as to be ignorant that he had made an impression on the heart of this artless child of nature. No one present appeared to suspect what was passing in the bosoms of either. Could he then, knowing that the bar was insuperable between him and her, could he act the double treachery of fastening affections, that must be hopeless, upon him; and make so ungrateful a return to the hospitality of her uncle and her mother, as to devote the youth of their beloved child to tears and disappointment? "No," said he to himself, "I will not load my already burdened soul with the guilt of rendering her unhappy; of having come hither on a demon's errand, to lay waste all that paradise of smiles! I deserve to go hence, as I came, a lonely, unregretted wretch."

While these thoughts were occupying the mind of Ferdinand, the Marquis was explaining to Mr. Athelstone that he must abide by the letter of his sovereign's commands; and not only relinquish the pleasure he had anticipated in visiting Morewick-hall, but take his leave even of the island, the following day. Finding this decision was not to be questioned, Mrs. Coningsby withdrew to give some necessary orders for her guest's early departure; and Alice, taking the opportunity of the opened door, hastily quitted the room. Cornelia having expressed her sincere regret to Ferdinand, that they must lose his father and himself so soon, in a few minutes followed her mother.

The gracious spell of tranquil enjoyment which an hour before had encircled them all, was now broken. Mrs. Coningsby hurried from place to place in hospitable bustle, ordering all kinds of travelling comforts to be put up for the service of their departing friends. The Marquis and the Pastor sat till a late hour, conversing in the library; but the young people continued dispersed, rather as if some cause of discord had fallen amongst them, than an order to separate hearts so well inclined to join. Once Alice had summoned courage to descend to the drawing-room, but on entering, she saw no one there but Ferdinand, who was resting his head upon her harpsichord; and hastily retreating, she did not come down again till summoned to supper.

The ensuing morning's meal was passed, like that of the preceding evening, by the younger part of the group almost in silence. But when breakfast was over Louis drew a letter from his pocket, and presenting it open to Mr. Athelstone, told him he had written that to his father, and he hoped the Marquis would have the goodness to take charge of it to Madrid. Santa Cruz bowed his acquiescence, and the Pastor perused the letter. As he ran his eye over its contents, he could not but admire the generous submission which had with-held the writer from even hinting the wish which so thoroughly possessed him. "You have written like an affectionate son," said the Pastor, as he returned the letter, "but you have not dropped one word of what is so much at your heart. Why do you not ask your father's permission to pay your personal duty to him?"

"And you give me yours, dearest Sir, to express that wish?"

"Certainly; and when the Baron's leisure will allow him to preside over his son's introduction to this perilous world, then, I doubt not, he will grant your petition, and I must resign you."

Louis gladly retired, to add, as a postscript to his letter, what he had found so much difficulty in preventing himself from making its primary subject. The ladies had already withdrawn; and Ferdinand seeing their waiving gowns through the distant shrubbery in the garden, believed that without any breach of his resolution, he might once more cool his feverish pulse with the breeze at their side; and for the last time sooth his disturbed soul by feeling himself near Alice, and listening to her tender accents.

The wish was no sooner formed than he was in their path. Mrs. Coningsby was not there. Cornelia was calmly gathering flowers to replenish her beau-pots, and Alice was walking pensively towards the wicket that opened to the hill. Ferdinand followed her, and with a bound of joy he could not conceal from his better reason, saw her open the little gate and pass through. A few sheep were cropping the grass on the pasture, and her favorite lamb frolicked before her. She did not notice it, but turned to the base of the hill. Ferdinand heard her draw a deep sigh, as she seemed to think herself removed from observation, and, in an agitated voice, she ejaculated his name. He required no more to be at her side,--at her feet. What he said he hardly knew, but he felt all his high resolves vanish, and that words failed under the impetuous declaration of his heart. Surprized at so unthought-of a disclosure; and alarmed at a language and vehemence she had never known before, Alice would have fled; but he detained her with her hands clasped in his: and while he wept upon them in the wild emotions of his soul, her tears flowed also; and he wrought her to confess that she had retired alone, to weep at his departure.

Ferdinand forgot all the wretched past, in the transport of that moment; and amidst the burning blushes of a timidity that trembled at every word she uttered, he drew from the guileless Alice all the secret of her heart. His dominant passion had again seized the rein; and clasping her hands to his breast, he ardently implored her to pledge him her faith before the Supreme of Heaven,--That, however long might be his absence, she would never be persuaded to become the wife of any other man. Then growing in his demands on the tender girl, he conjured her to promise not to continue that "exquisite softness of manner, to Mr. de Montemar, the sight of which had already more than half maddened him."--With a glance, which shone like a shooting star over the dewy night, she gave him the solemn pledge he asked; and she smiled, when she made a promise she deemed so unnecessary. But both engagements were hardly pronounced by her ingenuous lips, before his ungovernable selfishness smote upon the conscience of her lover.

"Alice," cried he, "I am unworthy of your angelic nature. I know I do not deserve that you should even look upon me. But I cannot bid you retract your vow. It is that alone which saves me from despair:--It is that alone which can support me in life, till we meet again.--Oh, Alice, you saw the wretch that came to this island, at war with himself, and sinking fast to an untimely grave!--You recalled me to existence!--You re-generated, and healed my broken heart!--But my father, should he know I love you, he would separate us for ever."

Alice raised her eyes, drowned as they were in tears, and looked on him aghast. "Is his rank so very great?"

"That is not my fear," returned Ferdinand, "his rank is not higher than your own illustrious blood. But he is so rigid a Catholic; I too well know he would rather see his whole race extinct, than one of them married to a Protestant."

Poor Alice was now seized with a violent trembling, and turning deadly pale, leaned for support against a tree. Ferdinand pressed her cold hand. "But I am no bigot, my beloved Alice; and there is a circumstance connected with my family, which may have power to influence a happier fate. It shall be tried; and it is of such importance, I hardly doubt its success." She revived at this assurance, and, with deepened tenderness, he resumed.

"Meanwhile, as we hope to be blessed hereafter in an union as indissoluble as our love; forbear to disclose what has now passed between us, to any of your own family. They would communicate it to my father; and the consequence I seek to avert, must then inevitably follow: an eternal separation."

The arguments of love, and the pleadings of despair, at last prevailed upon her to make this promise also. Her head was in a whirl of distracting thought. She had never known such distress as overwhelmed her, when, in making this second vow, she felt as if she had at once relinquished her claims on the affection of her nearest relations; and saw the being, for whose sake she had made this boundless sacrifice, on the point of leaving her for an unlimited time, perhaps for ever!

Ferdinand beheld the agony of her soul, and too well guessed her apprehensions. Now he felt the mischief he had wrought; now he saw the ruin he had begun in that so lately happy bosom. He had not only awakened a passion there, to feed upon her heart; but he had introduced the scorpions of an accusing conscience, where only a few moments before all was innocence and peace. "Wretch that I am!" cried he to himself; "to repay the blessing of thy tenderness with all this evil!"

But striving to sooth and to cheer her, he vowed to see her at all events early in the spring; and at the feet of her mother and her uncle, implore their pardon, and consent to an eternal union. When she became a little composed, he besought a ringlet of her hair to console him in his lonely absence; and having pressed the trembling hand that bestowed it, to his heart and his lips, he allowed her to break from the clinging arms that vainly tried to withhold her. She rushed through the garden into the house; and locking herself within her own room, gave way to the anguish of her soul.

Ferdinand turned towards a remote winding of the cliffs, fuller of self-arraignment than of satisfaction; yet though he detested the selfishness of his recent conduct, the headlong impulse he had yielded to his passion was too strong to allow him to make the only restitution now in his power:--to release her from both her vows.

At noon the boat was announced that was to bear the travellers to the carriage on the mainland, which was to convey them to the place of embarkation for Spain. In the hurrying moments of departure, the absence of Alice was remarked by none but the heart of Ferdinand; and it yearned towards the sensibility which prevented her sharing these last adieus. He touched the cheeks of her mother and sister with an emotion they did not expect. He hastily embraced Louis; and putting the hand of the Pastor reverentially to his lips, hurried down the rocks to the beach.

The Marquis's farewell was more composed; but as he crossed the sands to the boat, he stopped, and gathering up a few of the entrochi, (he had heard called Saint Cuthbert's beads,) he bent his head to the grey towers of the monastery, and turning towards Mr. Athelstone, said with a smile, "these shall be my rosary, in grateful remembrance of this holy isle!"

The venerable Pastor answered him with a benediction. He saw the father and son embark; and stood with his silvered head bare to the wind, as he waived his handkerchief to the diminishing vessel; and breathed a prayer for the safety of its freight, in every movement of his uplifted hands.

If Louis ever felt a touch of envy, it was at the moment when the distant sail disappeared from the horizon; and as he slowly followed the homeward step of his uncle, he sighed to himself; "they will soon see my father!--They will understand all his glorious plans for the service of his restored country!--They will witness his honours!--While I----down, my rebellious, my ungrateful spirit!"

CHAP. IX.

The remainder of the autumn was passed in Lindisfarne by the different members of the Pastor's family, with no change in the tranquil routine of their occupations, and little apparent alteration in themselves.