Chapter VI: Part 6

Next day, the butler of the family who took charge of her called on me. I accompanied him to the house, when one or two of the neighbours were prevailed upon to lend their assistance in getting her removed by force. The scene that followed was an extraordinary one. She resisted them to the last; as the struggle increased, her eye became more fiery, and her unearthly screams more loud and discordant--passing through all the notes of an incensed hen-mother, and attaining, at times, to the harsh scream which one may have heard from that feathered biped, when separated from her brood, and pursued by a band of urchins. The task of mere removal was not a difficult one, and was soon accomplished. Some curious observer examined the eggs, and found that not one of them was broken, so carefully had she performed her supposed duty of incubation. If she had sat the requisite time, there is not a doubt they would have been duly and legitimately hatched.

Such are the details of this extraordinary case. It is needless to say that it may transcend human belief. That is nothing, because belief is too much regulated by experience. I waited on the poor woman afterwards. The idea haunted her for about two months, and then gave place to some other wild conceptions, that in their turn gave way to others of a more rational character. Her son returned, and saw, with pleasure, the change that had taken place upon his parent. Latterly she became perfectly rational; but, if any one alluded in the remotest degree to her position in the tub, she shuddered with horror, and evaded the subject, as if it had terrors too dreadful to be borne.

THE ARTIST.

In the course of my practice, I have paid some attention to the effects of the two great stimulants, whisky and tobacco, on the bodies and habits of the votaries of excitement. There is a great difference in the action of the two substances; and I know no more curious subject for the investigation of the metaphysical physician, than the analysis of the various effects upon the mind produced by all the stimulating narcotics which are used by man, for the purpose of yielding pleasure or mitigating pain. I have myself committed to paper some thoughts upon this subject, which may yet see the light; and many of the conclusions I have deduced from my reasoning and experience, may be found to be curious, as well as instructive. I have found, for instance, that people of sanguine temperaments are greater drinkers than smokers; and those of a dull, phlegmatic cast are greater smokers than drinkers. A man that smokes will almost always drink; but a man that drinks will not always, nor indeed often, smoke. The two habits are often found combined in the same individual; but it is, notwithstanding, a fact, that, if the smoker and drinker could always command the spirit, he would very seldom or ever trouble himself with the other. I am led into these remarks by a case that occurred in my practice not very long ago, where the two habits joined in an extraordinary manner their baneful influences in closing the mortal career of one of those unfortunate votaries.

I was first called to William G----, a very ingenious artist, when he lay under a severe attack of what we call _delirium tremens_, or temporary insanity, produced by, or consisting of (for the proximate cause is often the disease itself), highly irritated nerves, the consequence of a succession of drinking fits. I found that he had been "on the ball," as they say, for three weeks, during which time he had drunk forty-two bottles of strong whisky. Like many other people of genius, whose fits of inspiration (for artists have those fits as well as poets) make them work to excess, and leave them, as they wear out, the victims of ennui and lassitude, he was in the habit of applying himself to his business with too much assiduity, for the period, generally, of about a month. Exhausted by the excitement of thought and invention kept up too long, he fell regularly down into a state of dull lethargy, which seemed to be painful to him. He felt as if there was a load upon his brain. A sense of duty stung him, after a few days' idleness, poignantly; and, while he writhed under the sting of the sharp monitor, he felt that _he could not_ obey the behest of the good angel; and yet could not explain the reason of his utter powerlessness and incapacity for work. If he had allowed this state, which is quite natural, and not difficult of explanation, to remain unalleviated by stimulants for a day or two, he would have found that, as the brain again collected energy, he would have been relieved by the _vis medicatrix_ of nature herself; but he had no patience for that; and drink was, accordingly, his refuge and relief. The first glass he took was fraught with the most direful power--it threw down the floodgates of a struggling resolution; the relief of the new and artificial impulse raised his spirits: another application inflamed his mind; and then bottle after bottle was thrown into the furnace, until the drink-fever laid him up, and brought upon him the salutary nausea which overcame the rebellious desire. This system had continued for more than ten years. He had been gradually getting worse and worse; and, latterly, he had resigned himself to the cognate influence of the narcotic weed.

When I got an account of this young man--for he was still comparatively young--and saw some of the exquisite pieces of workmanship, both in sculpture and painting, he had executed, I felt a strong interest in his fate. He was, indeed, one example out of many, where I had contemplated, with tears that subdued my professional apathy, genius, commonly supposed to be the rarest, if not the highest gift of mortals, working out, by some power inherent in itself, the ruin of the body, mind, and morals of its possessor. This victim I saw lying under the fell power of one of the most frightful of diseases, brought on by his own intemperance; and not far from his bed lay a half-finished Scripture-piece--a work which, if finished, would have brought him money and fame. He presented the ordinary appearances of his complaint. Emaciated and pale, he laboured under that union of ague and temporary madness which _delirium tremens_ exhibits. All the motions of his nerves seemed to have been inverted; those servants of the will had got a new master, which kept them, by his diabolical power, in continual action. His arms were continually in motion, aiming at some object present or ideal; but, instead of making direct for it, vibrating in sudden snatches backward and forward; his legs were also in continual agitation, kicking up the bedclothes, then being stretched forth, as if held by a spasm; and his eyes, red and fiery, seemed to fly from object to object, as if the vision of a thing burned the orbs, and made them roll about for a resting-place. Thousands of _muscae volitantes_, or the imaginary flies that swarm round the heads of victims of this complaint, tormented him by their ideal presence, and kept his snatching, quivering hands in continual play, till, by seizing the bed-posts, he seemed, though only for a moment, to get a relief from his restlessness. He knew no one; and sudden burning thoughts flashing upon his heated brain, wrung from him jabbering exclamations, containing intensive words of agony or mirth. The rest of his convulsed muscles was only purchased at the expense of such a morbid increase of the sense of hearing, that the scratch of a pin on the wall pained him as much as if the operation had been performed on his brain--a symptom often so strongly marked in regular brain-fever, and often detected in this last stage of the drunkard's disease. The sense of the pupil of the eye was of the same morbid character. A stream of light produced in him a scream, suggesting the analogy of the sound of the night-bird, the owl, when light is suddenly let into a nest among the young brood. The delights of life, sunbeam and sound, were transformed into poisons; so that his own vivid pictures, or the most melodious of songs, would have produced a convulsive spasm. Food was nauseous to him, and water swallowed by gulps, in the intervals of spasms, was all that could be taken without pain, to quench the burning fires within.

Such is a faithful picture of a disease produced by ardent spirits. I recommend it to the votaries of intemperance. The moment I saw the patient, I knew his disease; and the particulars furnished to me by an old woman who kept his house only corroborated my opinion. The remedies in such cases are well known to us, and were instantly applied. He remained in the same state nearly all the next day; but began to show symptoms of recovery on the morning following. Nature prevailed, and he got gradually better; having, while his weakness was on him, a strong _antipathy_ to ardent spirits--a symptom of the drunkard I have often observed. The interest I felt in him made me call often; and I had a long conversation with him on the philosophy and _morale_ of his intemperance. He went himself to the very depths of the subject; and I found, what I have often done in regard to other drunkards, that no one knew better the predisposing causes, the resisting energies, the consequences--everything connected with the fearful vice; but all his philosophy ended, as these often do, in the melancholy sentence, that "there are powers within us greater than reason or philosophy."

After the fearful attack he had had, he remained sober for about a month, and got a great length with his Scripture-piece. I called often to see his progress, to inspirit him in a continuation of his efforts, and support him in his self-denial. Matters seemed to be progressing well, and I hinted as much to his housekeeper; but she shook her head, and replied, calmly, "that she had seen the same scene acted, ten times a-year, for ten years." She added, "that he would break out again in a day or two;" and accordingly, on the next day, I discovered he had begun to lag in his work, to draw deep sighs, and to exhibit a listlessness, all premonitory signs of a relapse. Knowing that he was at times a smoker, I suggested to him the trial of tobacco, at this critical period. He said he had tried that remedy before; but acknowledged that perhaps he had not carried it far enough. I therefore set him agoing; advising him to keep to it steadily, for I had succeeded once before, in a very extreme case, in drawing out the one vice by the other--undoubtedly a lesser. So he began well, and persevered for about a week, during which time he had also got pretty well on with his work, having finished in that time two of the most difficult heads in the whole piece.

I had now some greater hopes of him, and told the housekeeper to do what she could to aid me in my efforts. Two days afterwards I called, and met the old woman at the door. She shook her head ominously as I passed her. I opened the door, and went in. On a chair opposite to his picture sat the artist, with his pallet in his left hand--the brush had fallen from his right--his head was hung over the back of the chair, and his cravatless neck bent almost to breaking. Beside him sat a bottle empty; there was no glass beside it. I took up the vessel, and smelled it. It had been filled with whisky. I now looked at the picture. It was destroyed. His burin had been drawn over it like a mop, and dashed backwards and forwards, as if he had taken a spite at it, and been determined to put an end in one moment to the work of six months!

There was now no occasion for a doctor; a drunkard fairly broken out is far beyond our help or care. I left him, and told the housekeeper to call and tell me when the fit was over. She did so; and I called again. I found him sitting on the same chair, perfectly sober, but so thin and wan, that he seemed like one taken from that place "where one inheriteth creeping things, and beasts, and worms." His languid bloodshot eye was fixed on the picture, and tears were stealing down his white cheeks. When I entered, he held his hands up to his face, to cover the shame that mantled on his cheek, and deep sobs heaved his bosom. I was moved, and sat down beside him without speaking a word.

"O God!" he exclaimed, "what am I to do with myself? Is there no remedy against this vice?--has the great Author of our being thus left us with an inheritance of reason, and a power that sits like a cockatrice on our brains, and laughs at the God-sent gift? See--see the fruit of six months' hard labour! I expected fame from that, and money. I would have got both. The fiend has triumphed. When I awoke from my dream, I heard his laugh behind the canvas. I am undone."

And he wrung his hands like a demented person, and sobbed bitterly. I was still silent; for any words I could have uttered would have destroyed the impressiveness of the scene before me. When I had allowed the sensation of remorse to sink deeper into him, I spoke:--

"I am glad that you have wrought this destruction," said I. "You have produced an antidote to your own poison--let it work. I have no medicines in my laboratory that have half the efficacy of that once splendid emanation of your genius--now the monument of your folly, and to be, as I hope, the prophylactic to save you from ruin and death."

"Ah, God help me! it is a dear medicine," groaned he. "I feel that I never can produce such a work again."

And he hung down his head, as if the blackest cloud that covers hope had thrown over him its dark shadow. I again observed silence, and he remained with his head on his breast for several minutes, without exhibiting a symptom of life beyond the deep sigh that raised his ribs.

"You must hang that picture upon the wall," said I. "It is the most valuable you ever painted. Look at it daily, and, before the sun goes down, begin another on the same subject."

My words produced no effect upon him, and indeed I knew that he was in a condition that entirely excluded external aid to his revolving thoughts. He was in the pit of dejection, which lies on the far side of the elevation of factitious excitement--a place of darkness, where the scorpions of conscience sting to madness, and every thought that rises in the gloomy, bewildered mind appears like a ghost that walks at midnight over open graves and bones of the dead. To some, these spectres have spoken in such a way as to rouse the dormant principles of energetic amendment, that lie beyond the reach of precept, or even that of conscience; but to the greater part of mankind this place of wailing and gnashing of teeth yields nothing but an agony that only tends to make them climb again the delusive mount from which they had fallen, though only again to be precipitated into the dreadful abode where, in the end, _they must die_. I knew that words had no effect upon my patient. I rose accordingly, and left him to the unmitigated horrors of his situation, in the expectation that he might be one of the few that derive from it good. I had no fear of his falling again, immediately, into another fit; for the period of nausea was only begun, and he was safe in the keeping of a rebelling stomach, whatever he might be in that of burning conscience.

He remained, as his housekeeper told me, in that state of depression for two days, often recurring to the monument of his folly, the destroyed Scripture-piece; weeping over it, and ejaculating wild professions of amendment, clenched by oaths in which the blessed name of God was made the guarantee of the strength of a resolution which the demon of his vice was standing with glaring eyes ready to overturn. I have no faith in outspoken resolves of wordy declamation: not sure of ourselves, we fortify our weak resolutions through the ear and the eye, by spoken and written adjurations, and promises of amendment. After the medicine of dejection had wrought its utmost effect, I waited upon him. He was arrayed in melancholy and gloom: but the agony of the lowest pit was gone, and he stood on a dangerous middle place, between a temporary fulfilment of his resolutions and a relapse. With a patient of this sort I never _continue_ a system of argumentation and disputation. I am satisfied it does injury; for it reaches the moral sore only to irritate it, and an argument surmounted, or sworn resolution vanquished, is a triumph and a _pabulum_ to the spirit of the foe greater than years of domination. I told him, what he confessed frankly, that he stood, for a day or two, on the dangerous ground from which he had so often fallen, and requested him authoritatively, as if I had assumed the reins of his judgment which he had thrown over the back of his passions, to begin instantly another painting, and try once more the American weed. Command sometimes, persuasion never, succeeds with a drunkard. He set about stretching his canvas, and put on the first coat of the foundation of his picture. I told him I would call again in a week; but that, as it was not a part of my profession to reclaim drunkards, I would discontinue my efforts in his behalf, if I found that, at the end of that time, he had swerved from his resolution. The sense of degradation in the mind of these lost votaries of intemperance, while it inclines the unhappy individuals often to resign themselves to the command (from which, however, they often break) of those they respect, responds keenly to the manifestations of disregard and loss of esteem with which they are visited in consequence of their failing. He felt strongly the manner of my treatment, and I thought and observed even tears working for vent from his still bloodshot eyes.

"You, and all good men, have a privilege to despise him who has not the approval of his own conscience," he said. "I could bear your persuasive reproof; but the thought that I have rendered myself unworthy of the trouble of one I esteem, to save me from the ruin I have madly prepared for myself, sends me to that deep pit of despair, from which I have even now struggled to get free. You saved me from death; and I was no sooner cured than I plunged headlong again into the gulf from which my disease was derived. I have made myself an ingrate, and a beggar; spurned your advice, and destroyed the work from which I expected honour and reward. I see myself as through a microscope, and you have diminished me still farther. Heaven help me!"

"You have powers within you, sir," replied I, with affected sternness, "through the medium of which you might have surveyed yourself as through the telescope; and your size would not have been greater than that potential moral magnitude to which you might long ere now have arrived, and which is still within your own power. I exhort not--I leave you to yourself.--_In te omne recumbit._"

"I know it, I know it," he cried, with a swelling throat. "My ruin or my salvation lies within my own breast. For ten years I have resolved, and re-resolved; and it is only three days since I destroyed that picture, and rose with fiery eyes and a burning heart to survey the consequences of my vice. O God! where is this to end? You saw what I suffered when extended on that bed, racked with pain; my brain on fire; my intellect overturned; my muscles twisted by spasms; my eyes and ears tortured by imaginary sights and sounds; with conscience in the back-ground, waiting till reason should bring to the avenging angel its victim. In that every mortal on earth might have found a lesson, but a drunkard. I found none. The very fire of my fever filled my soul with a thirst which precipitated me again deeper than ever in my old sin. I have got my senses again; and my bloodshot eyes have surveyed, and shall survey, that sad monument of my vice and folly--that child of my dreams, with which my pregnant fancy travailed with a delightful pain; and to which my fond hopes of honour, wealth, and happiness were directed--now, alas! dead--killed by my rebellious hand. From that dead body I have extracted a virtue which, with the powers of the amulet, shall guard me more effectually than the lesson of my bodily agony from further destruction. Believe me, sir. Aid me once again. If I fail this time, discard me for ever."

As he finished, he hung his head over the chair, and covered his face with his hands, to hide from me his agonised face. I told him that it was my intention to try what effect the destroyed picture would have upon him.

"You have made a fair beginning," said I. "Persevere--keep to the new picture to-morrow and to-morrow. I shall call in a week."

"You shall find me at work, and an altered man," he said; and a blush came over his face, as he tried to open some subject to me of a delicate nature. "I--I have for some time thought," he continued, "that the way in which I live--a bachelor, with few domestic enjoyments--has a part of the blame of this horrid vice that has taken possession of my soul. Had I a wife, my sensibilities would be fed, my ennui relieved, my home made comfortable, and my ardour for my profession keeping my mind in the delightful bondage of fancy, I might thus satisfy all the cravings of my feelings, and be independent of the liquid fire and the envenomed weed."

"You are a perfect AEsculapius," replied I. "Had I lectured to you for a week from the manual of Galen, I could not have suggested a better medicine; but, mark you, I know not if you have properly described the manner of its operation. A wife will do all for you that you have described; but there is a greater virtue in her; and that is, that she _ought_ to produce in you a salutary terror of making her unhappy. This is a part of love--and I know no greater conservative element of the pure passion. If you fall again into your old habits, you will render an innocent individual miserable; and that thought ought to make you fly the poison as if it were distilled from the herbs of Medea or Circe."

"Oh, I feel it, I feel it," he replied; "and am thankful to you for the suggestion. Like Pygmalion, I fell in love with a face that I sculptured last year. Every line I chiselled was engraven on my heart, and I have dreamed of her ever since. She is herself an artist, and paints beautifully. Our sympathies are kindred; and, though I never declared my passion, from a fear that my bad reputation for inebriety may have reached her, I have _looked_ it, and have reason to think that I may succeed."

"Try," said I; "and I shall then have every hope of you."

I left him, and heard some time afterwards that he had married a very pretty young lady, the daughter of an old artist that lived in the same town. It was not, however, (as I understood), till he had made a solemn promise and _oath_ to the old gentleman, who was possessed of some eccentricities, that he would renounce his habit of drinking, that the young female artist was yielded to him. I felt still the same interest in the man of genius, and called shortly after the marriage, to see how his _medicine_ had wrought. I found him as happy as the day was long. His picture was going on even during the honeymoon, and seemed to reflect a part of the sweet luminary's glory. The young wife, who was really pretty, and imbued with a strong love of both the artist and his art, looked over his shoulder as he proceeded with his work. I was delighted with the couple, and told him that the moment he had finished the picture he was occupied with, I wished him to give me a portrait of "the Doctor." He promised; and I left them, in the confidence--at times interfered with by my experience of the insidious power of the demon--that he would never again have recourse to his old habit.

"To go to see a cousin" is, as all married people know, a very pretty and very usual mode of keeping up the flame of love in the hearts of the young worshippers of Hymen. Mrs G---- went, accordingly (so I learned at a future period), to see a friend who lived in the country. The artist was left again by himself, and promised to his loving wife, who left him with a kiss of true affection, that he would have the piece he was engaged on finished by the time she returned, when he was to commence with my portrait.

"Never fear, Maria," he said, as he embraced her. "You have made me a new man. God bless you for it! I am happy now. Oh, that blessed thought, so opportunely confirmed by Dr ----! I shall paint him like an angel for it."

And, laughing through his tears, he again kissed her, and she left the house with the intention of returning in a week, with an affection increased, and the satisfaction of seeing the painting imbued with all the glory of his high genius.

I was, in the meantime, and while these love matters were going on, engaged in the pursuits of my profession. I knew nothing of them, but wished them happy, and thought all was right. I was sitting, after a day's labour, in my study. It was about eleven o'clock at night. I was startled by the artist's old housekeeper, who burst in upon me in great terror. Her eyes were absolutely starting from their sockets; and she stood before me with her mouth open, but without being able, for a time, to utter a syllable.

"What is the matter?" said I.

"Come to my master, for heaven's sake!" she cried, after some struggles of the throat. "He is vomiting fire."

"What can the woman mean?" said I, as I took up my hat, and hastened to the victim.

I soon found a sufficient explanation. The poor artist was lying on his back on the floor. There were a great number of empty bottles scattered _per aversionem_ round him. A blue, flickering flame was burning in his mouth, which was as black as a piece of coal. His eyeballs were turned up, and convulsive movements shook his frame. I was at no loss for the cause. A tobacco-pipe and a candle were beside him. After he had filled his stomach with whisky for six days, and drunk no fewer than thirteen bottles, he had, in endeavouring to light his pipe, set fire to the spirit that lay on his lips and in his mouth--the flame sought its way down the pharynx till it came to the full body of liquid in his stomach, and all was, in a moment, on fire. I need not dwell on the issue of this case. The poor artist was dead in an hour. Where was his resolution? This is no overcharged picture of the effects of drunkenness.

THE BRIDE.

Fifty years ago, William Percy rented a farm that consisted of about a hundred acres, and which was situated on the banks of the Till. His wife, though not remarkable for her management of a farmhouse, was a woman of many virtues, and possessed of a kind and affectionate heart. They had an only daughter, whose name was Agnes; and, as she approached towards womanhood, people began to designate her the _Rose of Till-side_. Her beauty was not of the kind that dazzles or excites sudden admiration; but it grew upon the sight like the increasing brightness of a young rainbow--its influence stole over the soul as moonlight on the waters. It was pleasant to look upon her fair countenance, where sweetness gave a character to beauty, mellowing it and softening it, as though the soul of innocence there reflected its image. Many said that no one could look upon the face of Agnes Percy and sin. Her hair was of the lightest brown, her eyes of the softest blue, and the lovely rose which bears the name of _Maiden's Blush_ is not more delicate in the soft glow of its colouring than was the vermilion tint upon her cheeks. She was of middle stature, and her figure might have served a sculptor as a model. But she was good and gentle as she was beautiful. The widow mentioned her name in her prayers--the poor blessed her.

Now, Agnes was about eighteen, when a young man of her own age, named Henry Cranstoun, took up his residence for a few months in her father's house. He was the son of a distant relative of her mother, and was then articled as a clerk or apprentice to a writer to the signet in Edinburgh. He also was the only child of his parents; for, though they had had eight others, he was all that death had left them. He was the youngest son of his mother; and there was a time when there was no mother had greater cause to be proud of her children. Yea, as they hand in hand, or one by one, went forth on the Sabbath morning with their parents to their place of worship, there was not an eye that looked not with delight or admiration on the little Cranstouns. The neatness of their dress, the loveliness of every countenance, the family likeness of each, the apparent affection of all, the propriety of their demeanour, interested all who looked upon them. But as untimely flowers, that by a returning frost are stricken down in beauty, so drooped, so perished, this fair and happy family. Some had said that they were too beautiful to live; and, as they also manifested much quickness and wisdom for their years, there were others who said to Mrs Cranstoun, as she was shedding their shining hair upon their brows, that she would never comb an old head! This is a cold, cruel, and ignorant prophecy; it has sent foreboding and unhappiness into the bosom of many a fond mother; but, in this case, it needed not the gift of a seer to foretell the gloomy tidings. Consumption lurked amidst the beauty that glowed on every cheek; and seven of the fair family had fallen victims to the progress of the insidious destroyer, till Henry alone was left. And now, even upon him also, it seemed to have set its mark. The hollow cough and the flushed cheek, the languidness by day and the restlessness by night, gave evidence that the disease was there.

Change of air and less study were recommended by the physicians, as the only means by which Henry might be saved; and he was sent over to Northumberland, to the house of William Percy, his mother's friend.

It was about that period of the year which is spoken of as the "fall of the leaf," when Henry Cranstoun first arrived at Till-side. William Percy had just gathered in his harvest, and Henry met with the kindly welcome of a primitive family. The father and mother, and their daughter, received him as one whom they were to snatch from the hands of death. In a few days, the goat's milk, and the bracing air, which came with health on its wings from the adjacent mountains, wrought a visible change in the appearance of the invalid. His cough became more softened, his eyes less languid, his step more firm, and he panted not as he walked. He felt returning strength flowing through his veins--in his bosom, in the moving of his fingers, he felt it. He walked out by the side of Agnes--she led him by the banks of the Till, by the foot of the hills, by the woods where the brown leaves were falling, and by the solitary glen.

Perhaps I might have said that the presence of Agnes contributed not less than the mountain air and the change of scenery to his restoration to health. Of this I have not been told. Certain it is that her beauty and her gentleness had spread their influence over his heart, as spring, with its wooing breath, awakens the dreaming earth from its winter sleep. It was not the season when nature calls forth the soul to love; for the cushat was silent in the woods, the mavis voiceless on the thorn, the birds were dumb on every spray, the wild-flowers had closed their leaves and drooped, and the meadows lost their fragrance. But, as they wandered forth together, a lark started up at their feet; it raised its autumn song over their heads; it poured it in their ears. Both raised their eyes in joy towards the singing bird; they listened to it with delight. His fingers were pressed on hers as he heard it, as though he would have said--"How sweet it is!" But the lustre forsook his eyes while he yet listened--he sighed, and was silent. They returned home together, and Agnes strove to cheer him; but his spirit was heavy, and he pressed her hand more fervently in his. The song of the lark seemed to have touched a chord of sadness in his bosom.

Henry was heard walking backward and forward in his room throughout the night; and on the following morning at breakfast he put a paper into the hands of Agnes, on which was written the following rhymes:--

THE LARK'S AUTUMNAL SONG.

(INSCRIBED TO AGNES PERCY.)

Again in the heavens thy hymn is heard,
Bird of the daring wing!
When last ye sprang from the daisied sward,
Making the welkin ring,
Thy lay the dreaming buds awoke--
Thy voice the spell of winter broke--
The primrose, on the mossy brae,
Burst beauteous into life and day,
And smiled to hear thee sing!
The children clapp'd their tiny hands;
The shout rang through their little bands,
Hailing the bird in spring!
Thy lay made earth and air rejoice,
And nature heard thee as an angel's voice.
Again in the heavens thy hymn is heard,
Bird of the mournful song!
A lonely daisy yet decks the sward,
The last of the summer throng.
While here and there, upon the brae,
Some primrose, _languid as the ray
Of hope that vanisheth away
Upon the cheek of death_,
Untimely opes its golden wing,
Mistaking, as it hears thee sing,
That thou art come to tell of spring,
And not of winter's wrath.
But now thy strain is as one that grieves--
Thou singest the dirge of the falling leaves!
Again in the heavens thy hymn I hear,
Bird of the merry song!
Thou art ringing a lay in old winter's ear--
Ye bid him farewell, and ye welcome him here--
Ye help the old man along!
Ye are singing to look on the fruits of the year
Gather'd in, and in ripeness, with plenty around;
And ye pour o'er earth's fulness a rapturous sound.
Ye are singing a strain that man should have sung--
Man with ingratitude seal'd on his tongue:
At _seed-time_, thy joyous and _hope-breathing_ lay,
To the ploughman was sung, as an anthem, all day,
And now at his _harvest_ ye greet him again,
And call him to join in thy _thanksgiving_ strain.

Agnes wept as she perused the foreboding lines, which he had marked in what printers call Italics, in the second stanza, by drawing a line under them. She felt interested in the fate of Henry Cranstoun--deeply interested. We believe that, like the gentle Desdemona, she wished that

"Heaven had made her such a man;"

for, though the young writer to the signet spoke not

"Of war, and broils, and battles,"

his tongue was the interpreter of nature--he dwelt as an enthusiast on its beauties, its mysteries, its benevolence, its glorious design; and, through all, he would point

"Through nature up to nature's God!"

It is a common saying, "that you cannot put an old head upon young shoulders!" but, if ever the truth of the saying might be disputed, it was in the case of Henry Cranstoun. The deaths of his brothers and his sisters had rested upon his young mind--they had struck it with awe--they had made him to feel that he, too, must die--he, indeed, felt as though the shadow of death were creeping over him; and the thoughts and the hopes of eternity early became the companions of his spirit. He treasured up the words of the inspired preacher, "Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth." He treasured them up, and he practised them; and his deportment gave him a deeper interest in the eyes of the Northumberland farmer and his family.

William Percy was esteemed by his neighbours as a church-going and a good man. He was kind to his servants; he paid every man his own; he was an affectionate husband and a fond father; the poor turned not away murmuring from his door; and every Sunday night he knelt with his wife and with his daughter, before their Maker, in worship, as though it were a duty which was to be discharged but once in seven days. Now, it was late on Saturday night when Henry Cranstoun arrived at their house; and, on the following evening, he joined in the devotions of the family. But Monday night came, and the supper passed, and the Bibles were not brought. Henry inquired--

"Is it not time for worship?"

The question went to the conscience of the farmer--he felt that before his Creator, who preserved him, who gave him every breath he drew, he had knelt with his family but once a-week. "Is not He the Almighty of all time and of all eternity?" asked his conscience; "and have I not served Him as though He were Lord of the Sabbath only? I forsake him for a week--where should I be if He left me but for a moment?"

"Agnes, love," said he aloud, "bring the books."

She cheerfully obeyed, and the Bibles were laid upon the table. The psalm was read, and the voice of praise was raised; and as the hinds in the adjoining houses heard the sound, they followed the example of their master. Hitherto, like their employer, they had lifted their voices in thanksgiving but once a-week, as if a few minutes spent in praise and in prayer, and in the reading of a chapter, were all that was necessary for example to a family, or for gratitude to Him who sustained, protected, and gave them being from moment to moment. I should not dwell upon this, were it not that there are many good and Christian parents who conceive that they fulfil the injunction of "praying often with and for their children," by causing them to kneel around them on a Sabbath night. But this, certainly, is a poor fulfilment of the oath which they have taken--or which, if they have not taken, they are equally bound to perform. I do not say that the man who daily prays with his family will have the gratification of seeing all of them following in his footsteps, or that all of them will think as he thinks; but he may be of one sect, and some of them of another; yet, let them go where they will--let them be thrown into what company they may--let temptation assail them in every form, and absence throw its shadows over their father's house--yet the remembrance, the fervour, the words of a father's prayers, will descend upon their souls like a whisper from heaven, kindling the memory and awakening the conscience; and if the child of such a man depart into sin, the small still voice will not die in his ear. Nay, the remembrance of the father's voice will be heard in the son's heart above the song of the bacchanal, and the lowly remembered voice of psalms rise upon his memory, making him insensible to the peal of instruments. I have listened to the sonorous swell of the organ in the Roman church and the Episcopal cathedral, to the chant of the choristers and the music of the anthem, and I have been awed by the sounds; but they produced not the feelings of peace and of reverence--I might say of religion--which are inspired by the lowly voices of a congregated family joining together in their hymn of praise. I have thought that such sounds, striking on the ear of the guilty, would arrest them in their progress.

Such was the change which Henry Cranstoun introduced into the house of his host. From that moment, Agnes regarded him with a deeper interest, her father loved him, and her mother looked on him as a son. But, although his mind had been early imbued with serious impressions, he was a lover of all that was beautiful in nature--he was warm of heart and eloquent of speech--and his form was such as the eye of a maiden might look on with complacency.

Christmas had passed before he left the house of his mother's friend, and health again glowed on his cheeks, strength revisited his frame. No one that saw Henry Cranstoun upon his entering the house of Mr Percy three months before, and who had not seen him in the meanwhile, would have known him to be the same individual. But Agnes noted no change in him. She knew that his health was now restored; but she had begun to hope and love at the same moment, and she had never thought that Henry would die. His eyes had ever been bright to her--his voice ever pleasing; and her beauty, her gentleness, her sweetness of temper, her kindness, her looks, her tones of affection, had fallen upon his bosom, till every thought, save the thought of Agnes, was banished.

He was to leave her father's house: he bade her _farewell_. Till that moment, they had not known how dear they were unto each other. They had never spoken of love; and, to hearts that do love, there is little need for such declarations. The affection of every glance, the guarded delicacy of every action, speaks it more plainly than the impassioned eloquence of language. True eloquence is feeling, and feeling dictates the words to be used, pouring them forth in the full tide of the heart's emotion; but, though love also be feeling, it is not of that kind which makes men eloquent. True love is dumb as true gratitude. It speaks from the glowing eye and the throbbing bosom; from the hand passionately grasped--not from the tongue.

Henry and Agnes said little; but they fell upon the necks of each other when they parted. She wept, and from his eyes the tear was ready to fall. He kissed her brow, and said that in the spring he would return.

He left Northumberland, and his parents welcomed him as one received from the dead. He was strong and healthy, and he alone, of all their children, seemed to have overcome the power of the destroyer. Yet a week never passed but he wrote to his friends, who had snatched him as from the gates of death; or rather, I should say, that he wrote to the gentle Agnes, requesting that the expression of his gratitude might be given to her parents, until he returned to thank them. But spring came; and with it Henry Cranstoun returned to Till-side. Health still glowed in his eyes, and beamed upon his cheeks. He was fond of angling, and, with his rod in his hand, he sought amusement in the gentle art; yet his favourite pastime afforded him no pleasure, save when Agnes was by his side, and then they would sit down on the brae-side together, with her hand in his, and the fishing-rod on the ground, and they forgot that he had gone out to fish, until evening came, and he returned with his creel empty.

Thus five years passed on, and twice in every year Henry Cranstoun visited his friends in Northumberland. He had commenced practice in Edinburgh; fair prospects opened before him; his marriage-day was fixed; and need I say that the bride was Agnes?

The ceremony was to be performed in the parish church, which was situated about a mile from her father's house. Henry was only expected to arrive an hour or two before the marriage was to take place. The bosom of fair Agnes throbbed with tumultuous joy. Her parents gazed upon her, blessed her, and were happy. She sat before them, arrayed, a bride for the altar. He whom she loved and they esteemed was that day to make her his wife. Her mother gazed on her with pride--she blessed her Agnes. Her father's heart glowed within him. The bridemaidens were come--Agnes was impatient, but still happy; no fear, no doubt, had risen in her mind. She knew her Henry.

But the last hour arrived, and Henry came not. Her uneasiness increased. The servants were sent to a neighbouring hill; but no chaise, no horseman, appeared in sight. Agnes became unhappy; paleness overspread her cheeks. The company were silent. Her father's watch hung over the mantelpiece, and she sat at the opposite side of the room; yet its ticking fell upon her ears slow and heavy, as sounds from a hammer on an anvil. Tears, which she had struggled to conceal, now gathered in her eyes. Some evil had befallen Henry, she said, and wept.

The hour which had been appointed for the ceremony was past; but still he came not. Her fears, her anxiety, increased, and she wept the more, refusing to be comforted. She knew not what she feared; but her breast was filled with misery. She had received a letter from him but three days before. She read it again--it breathed the language of impassioned affection, but his truth she doubted not; yet there was an incoherency, a vehemence, in some parts of the letter, which were not like the style of Henry. A vague horror shot across her thoughts, and her hand trembled, as she laid the letter aside.

Still the servants were despatched to see if he approached, and at length they brought tidings that two horsemen were riding towards the house. Agnes strove to wipe away the tears from her eyes, but her heart yet throbbed, and others rose in their place. The horsemen drew near the house. Those of the company who beheld them from the windows drew back with a look of dismay. Agnes clasped her hands together, as she beheld the expression of their countenances. The evil she apprehended was about to be revealed. The parish clergyman and the minister of the congregation to which Mr Percy belonged entered the room. She started from her seat as they entered--she wrung her hands on her bosom--her eyes seemed fixed and motionless with misery--her lips moved--her tongue struggled for utterance.

"Be comforted!" said one of the reverend visiters, kindly.

"Is my Henry dead?" she exclaimed--"is he dead?"

"He is not dead," was the reply; "but----" and the clergyman hesitated a moment to proceed.

"_His mind is dead!_" added the wretched bride, and sank back in her mother's arms. The dismal thought flashed upon her soul; the vague horror that she had shrunk from before became tangible--the incoherence and vehemence of passages in his last letter were suddenly and fearfully interpreted.

The tidings which the clergyman had to communicate, her fears had already told. The mind of Henry Cranstoun had become a wreck. A cloud fell upon his reason; and, on the day that he was to lead his bride to the altar, he was placed an inmate of the gloomy cells of Bedlam.

Several months had passed, and the grief of Agnes became more tranquil, but not less deep. She entreated permission to visit her bridegroom in the place of his confinement, and her parents fondly endeavoured to dissuade her from her purpose; but it became the one--the ruling wish of her heart--and they consented. Her father accompanied her to the dreary prison-house. But I shall not attempt to describe the heartrending interview, nor to tell how the iron which fettered him entered her soul. He knew her--he wept before her as a child--he exclaimed, "My brain!--my brain!" and pressed his hand upon his brow. Around him were strewed scraps of paper; she beheld her name upon each; they were covered with verses of love and of wildness. But I will not dwell upon the harrowing scene, upon the words that were spoken, and the fitful gleams of reason that flitted across his soul, as his eyes remained riveted on the face he loved. But when her father, with a faltering voice, suggested that they should depart, and took her hand to lead her from the cell, a scream of loud and bitter agony burst from the wretched maniac. "Agnes--Agnes!" he cried; and his wailing was as the lamentation of a lost spirit. Anguish overpowered her, and she was borne insensible from the cell in her father's arms.

Seven long and dreary years passed, and the mind of Henry was still bewildered; still was he an inmate of the melancholy asylum, and no hope was entertained of his recovery. But the heart of Agnes knew no change--for him she still shed the secret tear and offered up the secret prayer.

But her father's fortunes were altered. He had been induced to enter into a speculation with one who deceived him, and in it the industry of years was swallowed up and lost. He was obliged to leave his farm, and he now resided in a small cottage in its neighbourhood. Still there were many who sought the hand of the fair Rose of Till-side; but she chose rather to brood over the remembrance of poor ruined Henry than to listen to their addresses. But amongst them was a young gentleman named Walker, whose condition was far above hers, and who for two years had vainly sought a place in her affections. In the day of her father's distress, he had been his friend, and he yet sought to place him again in a state of independence. The health of Mr Percy, also, began to decline; the infirmities of age were growing upon him; and the little that he had been able to save from the wreck of his capital was wasting rapidly away. He became melancholy with the thought that he should die a pauper, or leave his wife and his daughter in want; and, in the presence of Agnes, he often spoke of Mr Walker--of the excellence of his character--of his wealth--of what he had done for him in the midst of his misfortunes--of what he still desired to do--and of his affection for her. She listened to her father's words in sorrow and in silence, and, on her pillow by night, she wept because of them. To her the remembrance of Henry Cranstoun was dearer than the temptations of wealth, and her heart clung to him with a constancy which neither time, misery, nor hopelessness could shake. She was grateful to her father's friend for the kindness he had shown him, and for the generosity of the proposals he had made--yet she found that she could not love him, that her bosom had room for none but Henry.

Poverty, however, entered her parents' dwelling, and her father seemed drooping for lack of nourishment which his increasing feebleness required. Her mother, too, sat silent and melancholy, occasionally raising her eyes to her daughter's face, with a look that implored her to save her father. The old man had been ordered wine daily; but their penury was now such that they could not purchase it, and the plainest food had become scanty on their table.

Such was their situation, and they were sitting sorrowful together, when Mr Walker entered the room. He approached Agnes respectfully, he took her hand.