Chapter III: Front Matter (3)

In the course of her pilgrimage she visited Paris, Geneva, Milan, Venice, Florence, Rome, Naples, Genoa, and various other cities. All the wonders of art and glories of nature in Italy's elysian land, seem to have borrowed additional splendor and beauty from the touches of her magic pencil--and in her reflections upon men and manners there is a purity of sentiment which could neither be sullied by the temptations of wealth and fashion, nor by the prevalence of licentious customs in that voluptuous climate.

We cannot deny to our readers the pleasure of a few extracts, which will fully justify the estimate we have placed upon this delightful volume.

The frivolous extravagance which in many things characterises the French people, and especially the Parisian circles, is thus described:

"_La mode_ at Paris is a spell of wondrous power: it is most like what we should call in England a rage, a mania, a torrent sweeping down the bounds between good and evil, sense and nonsense, upon whose surface straws and egg-shells float into notoriety, while the gold and the marble are buried and hidden till its force be spent. The rage for cashmeres and little dogs, has lately given way to a rage for Le Solitaire, a Romance written, I believe, by a certain vicomte d'Arlincourt. Le Solitaire rules the imagination, the taste, the dress of half Paris: if you go to the theatre, it is to see the 'Solitaire,' either as tragedy, opera, or melodrame: the men dress their hair and throw their cloaks about them _à la Solitaire_; bonnets and caps, flounces and ribbons are all _à la Solitaire_; the print shops are full of scenes from Le Solitaire; it is on every toilette, on every work table;--ladies carry it about in their reticules to show each other that they are à la mode; and the men--what can they do but humble their understandings and be _extasiés_, when beautiful eyes sparkle in its defence, and glisten in its praise, and ruby lips pronounce it divine, delicious, 'quelle sublimité dans les descriptions, quelle force dans les caractères! quelle âme! quel feu! quelle chaleur! quelle verve! quelle originalité! quelle passion!' &c.

"'Vous n'avez pas lu le Solitaire?' said Madame M. yesterday; 'eh mon dieu! est-il donc possible! vous? mais, ma chère, vous êtes perdue de reputation, et pour jamais!'

"To retrieve my lost reputation, I sat down to read Le Solitaire, and as I read, my amazement grew, and I did in 'gaping wonderment abound,' to think that fashion, like the insane root of old, had power to drive a whole city mad with nonsense; for such a tissue of abominable absurdities, bombast, and blasphemy, bad taste and bad language, was never surely indited by any madman, in or out of Bedlam: not Maturin himself, that king of fustian,

'---- ever wrote or borrowed,
Any horror half so horrid!'

and this is the book which has turned the brains of half Paris, which has gone through fifteen editions in a few weeks, which not to admire is '_pitoyable_,' and not to have read '_quelque chose d'inouie_.'"

Again,

"This is the place to live in for the merry poor man, or the melancholy rich one; for those who have too much money, and those who have too little; for those who only wish like the Irishman, 'to live all the days of their life,'--_prendre en légère monnoie la somme des plaisirs_--but to the thinking, the feeling, the domestic man, who only exists, enjoys, suffers through his affections--

'Who is retired as noontide dew,
Or fountain in a noonday grove--'

to such a one, Paris must be nothing better than a vast frippery shop, an ever varying galanty show, an eternal vanity fair, a vortex of folly, a pandemonium of vice."

At Milan the fair invalid was induced to visit the Scala, where she saw the _Didone Abandonnato_, a ballet by Vigano. This piece was founded upon the loves of Dido and Eneas, and the celebrated cavern scene in the 4th book of Virgil was copied _almost_ to the life. A noble English family just arrived at Milan, was present at the performance, and the effect upon one of its members is thus described:

"In the front of the box sat a beautiful girl, apparently not fifteen, with laughing lips and dimpled cheeks, the very personification of blooming, innocent, _English_ loveliness. I watched her, (I could not help it, when my interest was once awakened,) through the whole scene. I marked her increased agitation: I saw her cheeks flush, her eyes glisten, her bosom flutter, as if with sighs I could not overhear, till at length, overpowered with emotion, she turned away her head, and covered her eyes with her hand. Mothers!--English mothers! who bring your daughters abroad to finish their education--do ye well to expose them to scenes like these, and _force_ the young bud of early feeling in such a precious hotbed as this?--Can a finer finger on the piano,--a finer taste in painting, or any possible improvement in foreign arts, and foreign graces, compensate for one taint on that moral purity, which has ever been, (and may it ever be!) the boast, the charm of Englishwomen? But what have I to do with all this?--I came here to be amused and to forget:--not to moralize, or to criticise."

The picture of Venice, "throned on her hundred isles," is vivid and beautiful.

"The morning we left Padua was bright, lovely and cloudless. Our drive along the shores of the Brenta crowned with innumerable villas and gay gardens was delightful; and the moment of our arrival at Fusina, where we left our carriages to embark in gondolas, was the most auspicious that could possibly have been chosen. It was about four o'clock: the sun was just declining towards the west; the whole surface of the _lagune_ smooth as a mirror, appeared as if paved with fire;--and Venice with her towers and domes, indistinctly glittering in the distance, rose before us like a gorgeous exhalation from the bosom of the ocean. It is farther from the shore than I expected. As we approached, the splendor faded: but the interest and the {20} wonder grew. I can conceive nothing more beautiful, more singular, more astonishing, than the first appearance of Venice, and sad indeed will be the hour when she sinks, (as the poet prophecies) 'into the slime of her own canals.'

"The moment we had disembarked our luggage at the inn, we hired gondolas and rowed to the Piazza di San Marco. Had I seen the church of St. Mark any where else, I should have exclaimed against the bad taste which every where prevails in it: but Venice is the proper region of the fantastic, and the Church of St. Mark, with its four hundred pillars of every different order, color, and material; its oriental cupolas, and glittering vanes, and gilding and mosaics, assimilates with all around it: and the kind of pleasure it gives is suitable to the place and people.

"After dinner I had a chair placed on the balcony of our inn, and sat for some time contemplating a scene altogether new and delightful. The arch of the Rialto, just gleamed through the deepening twilight; long lines of palaces, at first partially illuminated, faded away at length into gloomy and formless masses of architecture; the gondolas glided to and fro, their glancing lights reflected on the water. There was a stillness all around me, solemn and strange in the heart of a great city. No rattling carriages shook the streets, no trampling of horses echoed along the pavement:--the silence was broken only by the melancholy cry of the gondoliers, and the dash of their oars; by the low murmur of human voices, by the chime of the vesper bells, borne over the water, and the sounds of music raised at intervals along the canals. The poetry, the romance of the scene stole upon me unawares. I fell into a reverie, in which visionary forms and recollections gave way to dearer and sadder realities, and my mind seemed no longer in my own power. I called upon the lost, the absent, to share the present with me--I called upon past feelings to enhance that moment's delight. I did wrong--and memory avenged herself as usual. I quitted my seat on the balcony, with despair at my heart, and drawing to the table took out my books and work. So passed our first evening at Venice."

At Florence she met with the poet Rogers, who seems to have been a familiar acquaintance:

"Samuel Rogers paid us a long visit this morning. He does not look as if the suns of Italy had _revivified_ him--but he is as _amiable_ and amusing as ever. He talked long, _et avec beaucoup d'onction_, of ortolans and figs; till methought it was the very poetry of epicurism; and put me in mind of his own suppers--

'Where blushing fruits through scatter'd leaves invite,
Still clad in bloom and veil'd in azure light.
The wine as rich in years as Horace sings;'

and the rest of his description worthy of a poetical Apicius.

"Rogers may be seen every day about eleven or twelve, in the Tribune, seated opposite to the Venus, which appears to be the exclusive object of his adoration; and gazing, as if he hoped, like another Pygmalion, to animate the statue: or rather, perhaps, that the statue might animate _him_. A young Englishman of fashion, with as much talent as espiéglerie, placed an epistle in verse between the fingers of the statue, addressed to Rogers; in which the Goddess entreats him not to come there _ogling_ her every day;--for though 'partial friends might deem him still alive,' she knew by his looks he had come from the other side of the Styx; and retained her _antique_ abhorrence of the spectral dead, &c. &c. She concluded by beseeching him, if he could not desist from haunting her with his _ghostly_ presence, at least to spare her the added misfortune of being be-rhymed by his Muse.

"Rogers with equal good nature and good sense, neither noticed these lines, nor withdrew his friendship and intimacy from the writer."

The fine arts which are cultivated with so much distinction in the "Etrurian Athens," attracted the particular attention of our accomplished traveller. Referring to the Dutch school and the Salle des Portraits,--she says,

"The Dutch and Flemish painters (in spite of their exquisite pots and pans, and cabbages and carrots, their birch brooms, in which you can count every twig, and their carpets in which you can reckon every thread) do not interest me; their landscapes too, however natural, are mere Dutch nature (with some brilliant exceptions,) fat cattle, clipped trees, boors and wind-mills. Of course I am not speaking of Vandyke, nor of Rubens, he that 'in the colors of the rainbow lived,' nor of Rembrandt, that king of clouds and shadows; but for mine own part, I would give up all that Mieris, Netscher, Teniers and Gerard Duow ever produced, for one of Claude's Eden-like creations, or one of Guido's lovely heads--or merely for the pleasure of looking at Titian's Flora once a day, I would give a whole gallery of Dutchmen, if I had them."

The following _coup-d'oeil_ of Florence is distinct and impressive:

"We then ascended the Campanile or Belfry Tower to see the view from its summit. Florence lay at our feet, diminished to a model of itself, with its walls and gates, its streets and bridges, palaces and churches, all and each distinctly visible; and beyond, the Val d'Arno with its amphitheatre of hills, villas, and its vineyards--classical Fiesole, with its ruined castle, and Monte Ulivetto, with its diadem of cypresses; luxuriant nature and graceful art, blending into one glorious picture, which no smoky vapors, no damp exhalations, blotted and discolored; but all was serenely bright and fair, gay with moving life, and rich with redundant fertility."

But it was in Rome, "the city of the soul," that the spirit of the authoress revelled amidst the magnificent trophies of art, and was refreshed in spite of pain and despondency, by the reviving beauties of nature.

"The weather is cold here during the prevalence of the tramontana: but I enjoy the brilliant skies, and the delicious purity of the air, which leaves the eye free to wander over a vast extent of space. Looking from the gallery of the Belvedere at sun-set this evening, I clearly saw Tivoli, Albano, and Frascati, although all Rome, and part of the Campagna lay between me and those towns. The outlines of every building, ruin, hill and wood, were so distinctly marked, and _stood out_ so brightly to the eye! and the full round moon, magnified through the purple vapor which floated over the Appenines, rose just over Tivoli, adding to the beauty of the scene. O Italy! How I wish I could transport hither all I love! how I wish I were well enough, happy enough to enjoy all the lovely things I see! but pain is mingled with all I behold, all I feel: a cloud seems for ever before my eyes, a weight for ever presses down my heart. I know it is wrong to repine; and that I ought rather to be thankful for the pleasurable sensations yet spared to me, than lament that they are so few. When I take up my pen to record the impressions of the day, I sometimes turn within myself, and wonder how it is possible, that amid the strife of feelings not all subdued, and the desponding of the heart, the mind should still retain its faculties unobscured, and the imagination all its vivacity, and its susceptibility to pleasure,--like the beautiful sun-bow I saw at the falls of Terni, bending so bright and so calm over the verge of the abyss, which toiled and raged below."

Having visited and examined in detail, with the feelings of an amateur, almost every thing worthy of note {21} in the ancient city--the sublime architecture of St. Peter's--the treasures of the Vatican and the Capitol--the numberless galleries of painting and sculpture--and having loitered with the spirit of an antiquary amidst the ruins of tombs and temples, our fair tourist describes the rapid _survey_ which she made with a view to generalize the whole.

"For this purpose, making the Capitol a central point, I drove first slowly through the Forum, and made the circuit of the Palatine hill, then by the arch of Janus (which by a late decision of the antiquarians has no more to do with Janus than with Jupiter,) and the temple of Vesta, back again over the site of the Circus Maximus, between the Palatine and the Aventine (the scene of the Rape of the Sabines,) to the baths of Caracalla, where I spent an hour, musing, sketching, and poetizing; thence to the Church of San Stefano Rotundo, once a temple dedicated to Claudius by Agrippina; over the Celian hill, covered with masses of ruins, to the Church of St. John and St. Paul, a small but beautiful edifice: then to the neighboring church of San Gregorio, from the steps of which there is such a noble view. Thence I returned by the arch of Constantine, and the Coliseum, which frowned on me in black masses through the soft and deepening twilight, through the street now called the Suburra, but formerly the Via Scelerata, where Tullia trampled over the dead body of her father, and so over the Quirinal, home.

"My excursion was altogether delightful, and gave me the most magnificent, and I had almost said, the most _bewildering_ ideas of the grandeur and extent of ancient Rome: every step was classic ground; illustrious names, and splendid recollections crowded upon the fancy--

'And trailing clouds of glory did they come.'

On the Palatine Hill were the houses of Cicero and the Gracchi: Horace, Virgil, and Ovid resided on the Aventine; and Mecænas and Pliny on the Æsquiline. If one little fragment of a wall remained, which could with any shadow of probability be pointed out as belonging to the residence of Cicero, Horace, or Virgil, how much dearer, how much more sanctified to memory would it be than all the magnificent ruins of the fabrics of the Cæsars! But no--all has passed away. I have heard the remains of Rome coarsely ridiculed, because after the researches of centuries, so little is comparatively known, because of the endless disputes of antiquarians, and the night and ignorance in which all is involved. But to the imagination there is something singularly striking in this mysterious veil which hangs like a cloud upon the objects around us. I trod to-day over shapeless masses of building, extending in every direction as far as the eye could reach. Who had inhabited the edifices I trampled under my feet? What hearts had burned--what heads had thought--what spirits had kindled _there_, where nothing was seen but a wilderness and waste, and heaps of ruins, to which antiquaries--even Nibby himself, dare not give a name? All swept away--buried beneath an ocean of oblivion, above which rise a few great and glorious names, like rocks, over which the billows of time break in vain."

Her journey from Rome to Naples was short and delightful. The following is one among innumerable descriptive passages in her diary:

"In some of the scenes of to-day--at Terracina particularly, there was a beauty beyond what I ever beheld or imagined: the scenery of Switzerland is of a different character, and on a different scale; it is beyond comparison grander, more gigantic, more overpowering, but it is not so poetical. Switzerland is not Italy--is not the enchanting _south_. This soft balmy air, these myrtles, orange groves, palm trees; these cloudless skies, this bright blue sea, and sunny hills, all breathe of an enchanted land; 'a land of Faery.'"

At Naples our traveller was fortunate enough to witness a brilliant eruption of Mount Vesuvius--and overcoming the natural timidity of her sex, she resolved to ascend the mountain at midnight attended by chosen guides and companions. Her account of the terrible spectacle is too graphic to withhold from our readers.

"Before eleven o'clock we reached the Hermitage, situated between Vesuvius and the Somma, and the highest habitation on the mountain. A great number of men were assembled within, and guides, lazzaroni, servants, and soldiers were lounging round. I alighted, for I was benumbed and tired, but did not like to venture among those people, and it was proposed that we should wait for the rest of our party a little farther on. We accordingly left our donkeys and walked forward upon a kind of high ridge, which serves to fortify the Hermitage and its environs, against the lava. From this path as we slowly ascended, we had a glorious view of the eruption, and the whole scene around us, in its romantic interest and terrible magnificence, mocked all power of description. There were, at this time, five distinct torrents of lava rolling down like streams of molten lead; one of which extended above two miles below us, and was flowing towards Portici. The showers of red hot stones flew up like thousands of sky rockets; many of them being shot up perpendicularly, fell back into the crater, others falling on the outside, bounded down the side of the mountain, with a velocity which would have distanced a horse at full speed: these stones were of every size, from two to ten or twelve feet in diameter.

"My ears were by this time wearied and stunned by the unceasing roaring and hissing of the flames, while my eyes were dazzled by the glare of the red, fierce light: now and then I turned them for relief, to other features of the picture, to the black shadowy masses of the landscape stretched beneath us, and speckled with little shining lights, which showed how many were up and watching that night; and often to the calm vaulted sky above our heads, where thousands of stars (not twinkling, as through our hazy or frosty atmosphere, but shining out of 'heaven's profoundest azure,' with that soft steady brilliance, peculiar to a highly rarified medium) looked down upon this frightful turmoil, in all their bright and placid loveliness. Nor should I forget one other feature of a scene, on which I looked with a painter's eye. Great numbers of the Austrian forces, now occupying Naples, were on the mountain, assembled in groups, some standing, some sitting, some stretched on the ground and wrapped in their cloaks, in various attitudes of amazement and admiration; and as the shadowy glare fell on their tall martial figures and glittering accoutrements, I thought I had never beheld any thing so wildly picturesque."

After spending the day with a select party of friends amidst the ruins of Pompeii, she draws the following picture of the celebrated environs of Naples.

"Of all the heavenly days we have had since we came to Naples, this has been the most heavenly; and of all the lovely scenes I have beheld in Italy, what I saw to-day has most enchanted my senses and imagination. The view from the eminence on which the old temple stood, and which was anciently the public promenade, was splendidly beautiful: the whole landscape was at one time overflowed with light and sunshine; and appeared as if seen through an impalpable but dazzling veil. Towards evening, the outlines became more distinct: the little white towns perched upon the hills, the gentle sea, the fairy island of Rivegliano with its old tower, the smoking crater of Vesuvius, the bold forms of Mount Lactarius and Cape Minerva, stood out full and clear under the cloudless sky; and as we returned, I saw the sun sink behind Capri, {22} which appeared by some optical illusion, like a glorious crimson transparency suspended above the horizon: the sky, the earth, the sea, were flushed with the richest rose color, which gradually softened and darkened into purple: the short twilight faded away, and the full moon, rising over Vesuvius, lighted up the scenery with a softer radiance."

We intended to have quoted other passages, in which our fair authoress sketches with striking eloquence, the exhibitions of _Sestine_, one of that extraordinary race called _Improvvisatori_--a race which seems to be almost peculiar to Italy; and which, far from being extinct, are still to be found in almost every town from Florence to Naples. Her description too of a splendid illumination at St. Peter's, and her just observations upon the works of the great masters, particularly of the _Divine Raffaelle_, are worthy of particular designation; but it would be an almost endless task to select passages from a work, which from beginning to end, and through almost every page, is a volume of thrilling interest. We shall content ourselves with one or two beautiful extracts distinguished for their deep moral tone, and somewhat connected, as we suppose, with that all-engrossing and mysterious source of melancholy which seems to have imbittered the peace and hastened the dissolution of this interesting female.

"It is sorrow which makes our experience; it is sorrow which teaches us to feel properly for ourselves and for others. We must feel deeply before we can think rightly. It is not in the tempest and storm of passions, we can reflect--but afterwards, when the _waters have gone over our soul_; and like the precious gems and the rich merchandise which the wild wave casts on the shore out of the wreck it has made--such are the thoughts left by retiring passions."

Again; what can be more affecting than her final adieu to Naples.

"When we turned into the Strada Chiaja, and I gave a last glance at the magnificent bay and the shores all resplendent with golden light; I could almost have exclaimed like Eve, 'must I then leave thee, Paradise!' and dropt a few natural tears--tears of weakness, rather than of grief: for what do I leave behind me worthy one emotion of regret? Even at Naples, even in this all-lovely land, 'fit haunt for gods,' has it not been with me as it has been elsewhere? as long as the excitement of change and novelty lasts, my heart can turn from itself 'to luxuriate with indifferent things:' but it cannot last long; and when it is over, I suffer, I am ill: the past returns with tenfold gloom; interposing like a dark shade between me and every object: an evil power seems to reside in every thing I see, to torment me with painful associations, to perplex my faculties, to irritate and mock me with the perception of what is lost to me: the very sunshine sickens me, and I am forced to confess myself weak and miserable as ever. O time! how slowly you move! how little you can do for me! and how bitter is that sorrow which has no relief to hope but from time alone!"

We shall quote only one of the many interesting specimens of poetry with which the volume is interspersed. It is an extempore translation of a beautiful sonnet of Zappi, an Italian poet.

"Love, by my fair one's side is ever seen,
He hovers round her steps, where'er she strays,
Breathes in her voice, and in her silence speaks,
Around her lives and lends her all his arms.

"Love is in every glance--Love taught her song;
And if she weep, or scorn contract her brow,
Still Love departs not from her, but is seen
Even in her lovely anger and her tears.

"When, in the mazy dance she glides along,
Still Love is near to poise each graceful step:
So breathes the zephyr o'er the yielding flower.

"Love in her brow is throned, plays in her hair,
Darts from her eye and glows upon her lip,
But oh! he never yet approached her heart!"

Upon the whole we earnestly recommend this book to the attention of the public, and especially to our fair countrywomen, whose pride and curiosity will be gratified in so rich an example of the taste and intellectual power of their own sex.

THE MAGDALEN AND OTHER TALES. By Jas. Sheridan Knowles, author of Virginius, The Hunchback, The Wife, &c. _Philadelphia: Carey, Lea & Blanchard_, 1833.

SKETCHES, by Mrs. Sigourney. _Philadelphia: Key & Biddle_. 1834.

Both these volumes are by writers of distinction; the first a gentleman well known to the British public, and the last an American lady who devotes her delightful seclusion, near Hartford, Connecticut, to the cultivation of the muses and to the moral improvement of society. Though both are excellent in their way, each is adapted to a distinct class of readers. Mr. Knowles will be particularly acceptable to those who think that the happiness of reading consists in _amusement_. He depicts with a graphic pencil, and his pictures will be highly attractive to the young, the ardent and romantic. Mrs. Sigourney takes a loftier aim. Though highly gifted with the powers of imagination, and of course capable of exciting that faculty in others, her object seems to be rather to touch the springs of the heart and awaken the moral feelings of our nature. Her spirit is not only imbued with poetry but religion. In all her productions that we have seen, there is a direct tendency to improve as well as to delight. She is an example altogether worthy of imitation among the professors of literature, in enlisting all its allurements in the great cause of human virtue.

Mr. Knowles' book consists of various interesting tales, one of which, "Love and Authorship," we have selected for publication as a fair specimen of the rest. It is a genuine love story, and of course will have its admirers. From Mrs. Sigourney's volume, we have transferred to our own pages the story of the "Patriarch," in which the fair authoress personates, in the narrator of the tale, a minister of the gospel. The scene is laid in the state of North Carolina; and the few remarks in allusion to Bishop Ravenscroft will strike many of our readers as faithful notices of the eloquence and piety of that distinguished and lamented champion of the cross.

LOVE AND AUTHORSHIP.

"Will you remember me, Rosalie?"

"Yes!"

"Will you keep your hand for me for a year?"

"Yes!"

"Will you answer me when I write to you?"

"Yes!"

"One request more--O Rosalie, reflect that my life depends upon your acquiescence--should I succeed, will you marry me in spite of your uncle?"

{23} "Yes," answered Rosalie. There was no pause--reply followed question, as if it were a dialogue which they had got by heart--and by heart _indeed_ they had got it--but I leave you to guess the book they had conned it from.

'Twas in a green lane, on a summer's evening, about nine o'clock, when the west, like a gate of gold, had shut upon the retiring sun, that Rosalie and her lover, hand in hand, walked up and down. His arm was the girdle of her waist; hers formed a collar for his neck, which a knight of the garter--ay, the owner of the sword that dubbed him--might have been proud to wear. Their gait was slow, and face was turned to face; near were their lips while they spoke, and much of what they said never came to the ear, though their souls caught up every word of it.

Rosalie was upwards of five years the junior of her lover. She had known him since she was a little girl in her twelfth year. He was almost eighteen then, and when she thought far more about a doll than a husband, he would set her upon his knee, and call her his little wife. One, two, three years passed on, and still, whenever he came from college, and as usual went to pay his first visit at her father's, before he had been five minutes in the parlor, the door was flung open, and in bounded Rosalie, and claimed her accustomed seat. The fact was, till she was fifteen, she was a child of a very slow growth, and looked the girl when many a companion of hers of the same age had begun to appear the woman.

When another vacation however came round and Theodore paid his customary call, and was expecting his little wife as usual, the door opened slowly, and a tall young lady entered, and curtseying, colored, and walked to a seat next the lady of the house. The visitor stood up and bowed, and sat down again, without knowing that it was Rosalie.

"Don't you know Rosalie," exclaimed her father.

"Rosalie!" replied Theodore in an accent of surprise; and approached his little wife of old who rose and half gave him her hand, and curtseying, colored again; and sat down again without having interchanged a word with him. No wonder--she was four inches taller than when he had last seen her, and her bulk had expanded correspondingly; while her features, that half a year before gave one the idea of a sylph that would bound after a butterfly, had now mellowed in their expression, into the sentiment, the softness, and the reserve of the woman.

Theodore felt absolutely disappointed. Five minutes before, he was all volubility. No sooner was one question answered than he proposed another--and he had so many capital stories for Rosalie, when she came down--and yet, when Rosalie did come down, he sat as though he had not a word to say for himself. In short, every thing and every body in the house seemed to have changed along with its young mistress; he felt no longer at home in it, as he was wont; and in less than a quarter of an hour he made his bow and departed.

Now this was exceedingly strange; for Rosalie, from a pretty little girl, had turned into a lovely young woman. If a heart looked out of her eyes before, a soul looked out of them now; her arm, which formerly the sun had been allowed to salute when he liked, and which used to bear the trace of many a kiss that he had given it, now shone white through a sleeve of muslin, like snow behind a veil of haze; her bosom had enlarged its wavy curve, and leaving her waist little more than the span it used to be, sat proudly heaving above it; and the rest of her form which, only six months ago, looked trim and airy in her short and close-fitting frock now lengthening and throwing out its flowing line, stood stately in the folds of a long and ample drapery. Yet could not all this make up for the want of the little wife that used to come and take her seat upon Theodore's knee.

To be sure there was another way of accounting for the young man's chagrin. He might have been disappointed that Rosalie, when five feet four, should be a little more reserved than when she was only five feet nothing. Romantic young men, too, are apt to fancy odd things. Theodore was a very romantic young man; and having, perhaps traced for himself the woman in the child--as one will anticipate, in looking at a peach that is just knit, the hue, and form, and flavor of the consummate fruit--he might have set Rosalie down in his mind as his wife in earnest, when he appeared to call her so only in jest.

Such was the case. Theodore never calculated that Rosalie knew nothing about his dreams--that she had no such vision herself; he never anticipated that the frankness of girlhood would vanish, as soon as the diffidence of young womanhood began its blushing reign; the thought never occurred to him that the day would come when Rosalie would scruple to sit on his knee--ay, even though Rosalie should then begin to think upon him, as for many a year before he had thought upon her. He returned from college the fifth time; he found that the woman which he imagined in a year or two she would become, was surpassed by the woman that she already was; he remarked the withdrawal of confidence, the limitation of familiarity--the penalty which he must inevitably pay for her maturing--and he felt repelled and chilled, and utterly disheartened by it.

For a whole week he never returned to the house. Three days of a second week elapsed, and still he kept away. He had been invited, however to a ball which was to be given there the day following; and, much as he was inclined to absent himself, being a little more inclined to go--he went.

Full three hours was he in the room without once setting his eyes upon Rosalie. He saw her mother and her father, and talked with them; he saw 'squire this and doctor that, and attorney such-a-one, and had fifty things to say to each of them; he had eyes and tongue for every body, but Rosalie--not a look, or a word did he exchange with her; yet he was here and there and every where! In short he was all communicativeness and vivacity, so that every one remarked how bright he had become since his last visit to college!

At last, however, his fine spirits all at once seemed to forsake him, and he withdrew to the library, which was lighted up for the occasion as an anti-room, and taking a volume out of the book-case, threw himself into a chair and began to turn over the leaves.

"Have you forgotten your little wife," said a soft voice near him--'twas Rosalie's--"if you _have_," she added as he started from his seat, "she has not forgotten you."

She wore a carnation in her hair--the hue of the flower was not deeper than that of her cheek as she stood and extended her hands to Theodore who, the moment he rose, had held forth both of his.

"Rosalie!"

"Theodore!"--He led her to a sofa, which stood in a recess on the opposite side of the room, and for five minutes not another word did they exchange.

At length she gently withdrew her hand from his--she had suffered him to hold it all that time--"We shall be observed," said she.

"Ah Rosalie," replied he, "nine months since you sat upon my knee, and they observed us, yet you did not mind it!"

"You know I am a woman now," rejoined Rosalie, hanging her head, "and--and--will you lead off the next dance with me?" cried she, suddenly changing the subject. "There now; I have asked you," added she, "which is more than you deserve!"--Of course Theodore was not at all happy to accept the challenge of the metamorphosed Rosalie.

One might suppose that the young lady's heart was interested, and that Theodore was a far happier man than he imagined himself to be. The fact was neither more nor less. Little Rosalie was proud of being called Theodore's wife, because she heard every body else speak in praise of him. Many a marriageable young lady had she heard declare--not minding to speak before a child--that Theodore was the finest young man {24} in B----; that she hoped Theodore would be at such or such a house where she was going to dine, or spend the evening; nay, that she would like to have a sweetheart like Theodore. Then would Rosalie interpose, and with a saucy toss of her head exclaim, nobody should have Theodore but Rosalie, for Rosalie was his little wife, 'twas thus she learned to admire the face and person of Theodore, who more than once paid for her acquired estimation of them; for sometimes before a whole room full of company she would march up to him, and scanning him from head to foot, with folded arms, at length declare aloud, that he _was_ the handsomest young man in B----. Then Theodore was so kind to her, and thought so much of any thing she did, and took such notice of her! Often, at a dance, he would make her his partner for the whole evening; and there was Miss Willoughby, perhaps, or Miss Miller, sitting down, either of whom would have given her eyes to stand up if only in a reel with Theodore.

But when the summer of her seventeenth year beheld her bursting into womanhood; when her expanding thoughts, from a bounding, fitful, rill-like current, began to run a deep, a broad, and steady stream; when she found that she was almost arrived at the threshold of the world, and reflected that the step which marks a female's first entrance into it is generally taken in the hand of a partner--the thought of who that partner might be, recalled Theodore to her mind--and her heart fluttered as she asked herself the question--should she ever be indeed his wife? when, this time, he paid his first visit, Rosalie was as much mortified as he was. Her vexation was increased when she saw that he absented himself; she resolved, if possible, to ascertain the cause; and persuaded her mother to give a ball, and specially invite the young gentleman. He came: she watched him, observed that he neither inquired after her nor sought for her; and marked the excellent terms that he was upon with twenty people, about whom she knew him to be perfectly indifferent. Women have a perception of the workings of the heart, far more quick and subtle than we have. She was convinced that all his fine spirits were forced--that he was acting a part. She suspected that while he appeared to be occupied with every body but Rosalie--Rosalie was the only body that was running in his thoughts. She saw him withdraw to the library; she followed him; found him sitting down with a book in his hand; perceived, from his manner of turning over the leaves, that he was intent on any thing but reading.--She was satisfied that he was thinking of nothing but Rosalie. The thought that Rosalie might one day become indeed his wife, now occurred to her for the thousandth time, and a thousand times stronger than ever; a spirit diffused itself through her heart which had never been breathed into it before; and filling it with hope and happiness, and unutterable contentment, irresistibly drew _it_ towards him. She approached him, accosted him, and in a moment was seated with him, hand in hand, upon the sofa!

As soon as the dance was done,--"Rosalie," said Theodore, "'tis almost as warm in the air as in the room! will you be afraid to take a turn with me in the garden?"

"I will get my shawl in a minute," said Rosalie, "and meet you there;" and the maiden was there almost as soon as he.

They proceeded, arm-in-arm, to the farthest part of the garden; and there they walked up and down without either seeming inclined to speak, as though their hearts could discourse through their hands, which were locked in one another.

"Rosalie!" at last breathed Theodore. "Rosalie!" breathed he a second time, before the expecting girl could summon courage to say "Well!" "I cannot go home to-night," resumed he, "without speaking to you." Yet Theodore seemed to be in no hurry to speak; for there he stopped, and continued silent so long that Rosalie began to doubt whether he would open his lips again.

"Had we not better go in?" said Rosalie, "I think I hear them breaking up."

"Not yet," replied Theodore.

"They'll miss us," said Rosalie.

"What of that?" rejoined Theodore.

"Nay," resumed the maid, "we have remained long enough, and at least allow me to go in."

"Stop but another minute, dear Rosalie!" imploringly exclaimed the youth.

"For what!" was the maid's reply.

"Rosalie," without a pause resumed Theodore, "you used to sit upon my knee, and let me call you wife. Are those times passed forever? dear Rosalie!--will you never let me take you on my knee and call you wife again?"

"When we have done with our girlhood, we have done with our plays," said Rosalie.

"I do not mean in _play_, dear Rosalie," cried Theodore. "It is not playing at man and wife to walk, as such, out of church. Will you marry me, Rosalie?"

Rosalie was silent.

"Will you marry me?" repeated he.

Not a word would Rosalie speak.

"Hear me?" cried Theodore. "The first day, Rosalie, I took you upon my knee, and called you my wife, jest as it seemed to be, my heart was never more in earnest. That day I wedded you in my soul; for though you were a child, I saw the future woman in you, rich in the richest attractions of your sex. Nay, do me justice; recal what you yourself have known of me; inquire of others. To whom did I play the suitor from that day? To none but you, although to you I did not seem to play it. Rosalie! was I not always with you? Recollect now! did a day pass, when I was at home, without my coming to your father's house! When there were parties there, whom did I sit beside, but you? Whom did I stand behind at the piano forte, but you? Nay for a whole night, whom have I danced with, but you? Whatever you might have thought _then_, can you believe _now_, that it was merely a playful child that could so have engrossed me? No, Rosalie! it was the virtuous, generous, lovely, loving woman, that I saw in the playful child. Rosalie! for five years have I loved you, though I never declared it to you till now. Do you think I am worthy of you? Will you give yourself to me? Will you marry me? Will you sit upon my knee again, and let me call you wife?"

Three or four times Rosalie made an effort to speak; but desisted, as if she knew not what to say, or was unable to say what she wished; Theodore still holding her hand. At last, "Ask my father's consent!" she exclaimed, and tried to get away; but before she could effect it she was clasped to the bosom of Theodore, nor released until the interchange of the first pledge of love had been forced from her bashful lips!--She did not appear, that night, in the drawing-room again.

Theodore's addresses were sanctioned by the parents of Rosalie. The wedding day was fixed; it wanted but a fortnight to it, when a malignant fever made its appearance in the town; Rosalie's parents were the first victims. She was left an orphan at eighteen, and her uncle, by her mother's side, who had been nominated her guardian in a will, made several years, having followed his brother-in-law and sister's remains to the grave, took up his residence at B----.

Rosalie's sole consolation now was such as she received from the society of Theodore; but Theodore soon wanted consolation himself. His father was attacked by the fever and died, leaving his affairs, to the astonishment of every one, in a state of the most inextricable embarrassment; for he had been looked upon as one of the wealthiest inhabitants of B----. This was a double blow to Theodore, but he was not aware of the weight of it till, after the interment of his father, he repaired, for the first time to resume his visits to his Rosalie.

He was stepping up without ceremony to the drawing-room, when the servant begged his pardon for stopping him, telling him, at the same time, that he had {25} received instructions from his master to shew Theodore into the parlor when he should call.

"Was Miss Wilford there?"

"No." Theodore was shewn into the parlor. Of all savage brutes, the human brute is the most pernicious and revolting, because he unites to the evil properties of the inferior animal the mental faculties of the superior one; and then he is at large. A vicious tempered dog you can muzzle and render innocuous; but there is no preventing the human dog that bites from fleshing his tooth; he is sure to have it in somebody. And then the infliction is so immeasurably more severe!--the quick of the mind is so much more extensive than that of the body! Besides, the savage that runs upon four legs is so inferior in performance to him that walks upon two? 'Tis he that knows how to gnaw! I have often thought it a pity and a sin that the man who plays the dog should be protected from dying the death of one. He should hang, and the other go free.

"Well, young gentleman!" was the salutation which Theodore received when he entered the parlor; "and pray what brings you here?"

Theodore was struck dumb; and no wonder.

"Your father, I understand, has died a beggar! Do you think to marry my niece?" If Theodore respired with difficulty before, his breath was utterly taken away at this. He was a young man of spirit, but who can keep up his heart, when his ship, all at once, is going down.

The human dog went on. "Young gentleman, I shall be plain with you, for I am a straightforward man; young women should mate with their matches--you are no match for my niece; so a good morning to you!" How more in place to have wished him a good halter! saying this, the straightforward savage walked out of the room, leaving the door wide open, that Theodore might have room for egress; and steadily walked up stairs.

It was several minutes before he could recover his self-recollection. When he did so he rang the bell.

"Tell your master I wish to speak to him," said Theodore to the servant who answered it. The servant went up stairs after his master, and returned.

"I am sorry, sir," said he, "to be the bearer of such an errand; but my master desires you instantly to quit the house; and has commanded me to tell you that he has given me orders not to admit you again."

"I must see Miss Wilford!" exclaimed Theodore.

"You cannot, sir!" respectfully remarked the servant, "for she is locked in her room; but you can send a message to her," added he in a whisper, "and I will be the bearer of it. There is not a servant in the house, Mr. Theodore, but is sorry for you to the soul."

This was so much in season, and was so evidently spoken from the heart, that Theodore could not help catching the honest fellow by the hand. Here the drawing-room bell was rung violently.

"I must go, sir," said the servant; "what message to my mistress?"

"Tell her to give me a meeting, and to apprize me of the time and place," said Theodore; and the next moment the hall door was shut upon him.

One may easily imagine the state of the young fellow's mind. To be driven with insult and barbarity from the house in which he had been received a thousand times with courtesy and kindness--which he looked upon as his own! Then, what was to be done? Rosalie's uncle, after all, had told him nothing but the truth. His father had died a beggar! Dear as Rosalie was to Theodore, his own pride recoiled at the idea of offering her a hand which was not the master of a shilling! Yet was not Theodore portionless. His education was finished; that term he had completed his collegiate studies. If his father had not left him a fortune, he had provided him with the means of making one himself--at all events, of commanding a competency. He had the credit of being a young man of decided genius, too. "I will not offer Rosalie a beggar's hand!" exclaimed Theodore; "I shall ask her to remain true to me for a year; and I'll go to London, and maintain myself by my pen. It may acquire me fame as well as fortune; and then I may marry Rosalie?"

This was a great deal of work to be done in a year; but if Theodore was not a man of genius, he possessed a mind of that sanguine temperament, which is usually an accompaniment of the richer gift. Before the hour of dinner all his plans were laid, and he was ready to start for London. He waited for nothing but a message from Rosalie, and as soon as the sweet girl could send it, it came to him. It appointed him to meet her in the green lane after sunset; the sun had scarcely set when he was there; and there, too, was Rosalie. He found that she was Rosalie still. Fate had stripped him of fortune; but she could not persuade Rosalie to refuse him her hand, or her lip; when, half-way down the lane, she heard a light quick step behind her, and, turning, beheld Theodore.

Theodore's wishes, as I stated before, were granted soon as communicated: and now nothing remained but to say good by--perhaps the hardest thing to two young lovers. Rosalie stood passive in the arms of Theodore, as he took the farewell kiss, which appeared as if it would join his lips to hers for ever, instead of tearing them away. She heard her name called from a short distance, and in half-suppressed voice; she started and turned towards the direction whence the pre-concerted warning came; she heard it again; she had stopped till the last moment! She had half withdrawn herself from Theodore's arms; she looked at him; flung her own around him, and burst into tears upon his neck!--In another minute there was nobody in the lane.

London is a glorious place for a man of talent to make his way in--provided he has extraordinary good luck. Nothing but merit can get on there; nothing is sterling that is not of its coinage. Our provincial towns won't believe that gold is gold unless it has been minted in London. There is no trickery there; no treating, no canvassing, no intrigue, no coalition! there, worth has only to show itself if it wishes to be killed with kindness! London tells the truth! You may swear to what it says--whatsoever may be proved to the contrary. The cause--the cause is every thing in London! Shew but your craft, and straight your brethren come crowding around you, and if they find you worthy, why you shall be brought into notice--even though they should tell a lie for it and damn you. Never trouble yourself about getting on by interest in London! Get on by yourself. Posts are filled there by merit: or if the man suits not the office, why the office is made to adapt itself to the man, and so there is unity after all! What a happy fellow was Theodore to find himself in such a place as London!

He was certainly happy in one thing: the coach in which he came set him down at a friend's whose circumstances were narrow, but whose heart was large--a curate of the Church of England. Strange that, with all the appurtenances of hospitality at its command, abundance should allow it to be said, that the kindest welcome which adversity usually meets with, is that which it receives from adversity! If Theodore found that the house was a cold one to what he had been accustomed, the warmth of the greeting made up for it. "They breakfasted at nine, dined at four, and, if he could sleep upon the sofa, why there was a bed for him!" In a day he was settled, and at his work.