Kitabı oku: «Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848», sayfa 3
CHAPTER II
Spirit-like fair forms are pressing
'Round her now,
With their angel hands caressing
Her pale brow.
Words of solace they are chanting,
Sweet and clear,
That evermore will now be haunting
Her life here.
I visited the cottage frequently, and for several months after Mr. Germaine's death, it was the scene of no ordinary grief. Mrs. Germaine bore her bereavement patiently – for it was an event she had long anticipated with womanly meekness and resignation; but she mourned most deeply – for it is a great mistake to think commonplace persons deficient in vividness of feeling. I believe their emotions are as keen, and generally more enduring, than those of more decided minds, from the very fact of their possessing few self-resources to divert the course of affliction. Be this as it may, Mrs. Germaine was soon, in all that was apparent, the quiet and anxious mother she had always been; and if she suffered still, it was in the silence of a heart that had no language for its sorrows. Far wilder and more vehement was the passionate and unresisted tide of Theresa's suffering; and for many weeks she refused all the consolation that could be offered to a child of her age. She would sit by my side and converse of her father, with an admiration for his virtues, and an appreciation of his character far beyond what I had supposed she could comprehend.
This violent emotion necessarily exhausted itself, as a heavy cloud weeps itself away; but for a long time she was painfully dejected, and her face lost its childishness of expression, and wore a look of appealing, unspeakable melancholy I never remarked on any other countenance. It was the "settled shadow of an inward strife," the outward impress of a mind suddenly aroused to a knowledge of trial, and never again to sleep in unconsciousnes; and often in after years, the same inexpressible look darkened her brow through the tumult of conflicting impulses, and amid the war of triumph and pain.
I have said that Mr. Germaine's pecuniary circumstances were limited; but for some time previous to his illness, he had, at the expense of many a personal comfort, laid by a sum sufficient to procure for Theresa all the advantages of an accomplished education. His wife had frequently remonstrated against the innumerable little privations he voluntarily endured for this favorite purpose, for she attached more value to physical than mental gratifications, and could scarcely sympathize with his disinterested solicitude for his daughter's intellectual culture. It had been a great happiness to him to trace the gradual development of her intelligence, and to direct her simple studies; and it had been one of his last requests that I would in this respect occupy his place until she should be old enough to require other superintendence. His love was one of hope and trust, and he had diligently sown the seed, though he knew he never might behold its ripening.
For two months I made no attempt to alter the current of her thoughts, believing it better to allow her sensibilities to exhaust themselves without interruption. When she grew calmer, I proposed that she should come every morning to the parsonage to resume her daily studies; and, as I had hoped and anticipated, she eagerly acceded to the arrangement. And thus commenced the cultivation of a mind, whose early maturity bore a rich harvest of recompense; and thus dawned that loving anxiety for my pupil's welfare which realized many of my life's younger wishes, and lent so sunny and living an interest to my solitary and remembering years.
It was with some difficulty and after much remonstrance that I induced Theresa's application to the graver branches of acquirement, which, with my old-fashioned ideas of education, I considered indispensable even to a woman. At last, I believe, it was only through affection for me that she yielded her taste, and consented to devote her mind to such acquisitions. Her inclinations were all for what was beautiful or imaginative; she early loved whatever touched her feelings or awoke the vivid impressions of her young fancy; and I found some trouble in curbing within rational limits her natural and fascinating prepossessions. As she grew older, and passed what she deemed the drudgery of learning, and drew nearer, with rapid steps, to Thought's promised land of compensation, we constantly read and conversed together. We dwelt on the inspired pages of the poets, I, with old age's returning love for the romantic, and increasing reverence for the true, and she, with the intense, bewildered delight of a spirit that hoped all things, and a simple faith that trusted the future would brightly fulfill all the fairest prospects which poetry could portray.
Her disposition was sanguine to an extreme, with the happy faculty of believing what she hoped; and she possessed in a remarkable degree the power of expressing and defining her ideas and emotions, and rendering them visible by words. She never paused for an expression, or selected an injudicious one; and her fluency was the result of a mingled vividness and clearness of intellect, blended with artist-skill, and all the fervor of dawning and dreaming womanhood.
Her affections were spontaneous and impassioned, at once impulsive and enduring, and, like all enthusiasts, she was frequently governed by prejudice. Her little sister was a child of rare beauty and gentleness, and was Theresa's perfect idol. She was perpetually contriving pleasant surprises for her favorite; and it was her delight to wreath flowers around Amy's golden curls, and to add a thousand fantastic decorations to her delicate and seraphic loveliness. They would have made an exquisite picture, those two sisters, so different in age and character; the one so fair, with childhood's silent and fragile beauty, the other glowing with life and premature thought, already testing the "rapture of the strife," and revealing in the intense gaze of her dark, restless eyes, the world of gleaming visions within whose enchantment she lived.
It was when my pupil had reached her fourteenth year, that, in obedience to her father's written directions, she prepared to leave our tranquil home, to enter the school of the convent, near the city of – . I know not why Mr. Germaine wished her placed there, for he was himself a Protestant, but the advantages of instruction were at that time tempting. Probably, in dwelling on them, he overlooked the risk of placing his daughter where the unnumbered graces of mind and manner veil another creed, and make it alluring, and where the imaginative and gorgeous pomp of a different faith were to be placed in their most attractive colors before her unsuspecting eyes. It was with many a misgiving, many a secret fear, that I anticipated Theresa's removal from my watchfulness; and I warned her with the most sincere affection, against the temptations of various kinds which she would probably encounter in her new abode. Early in the autumn we were to part with her, and the sweet summer, with its wealth of fruit and flowers was now around us, and our village, in its garlands of blossoms, looked its loveliest.
CHAPTER III
O! were it thus! had we, indeed, the gift,
Though human, our humanity to chain;
Could we in truth our restless spirits lift,
And never feel the weight of earth again,
Then would I leave the sorrows I bewail,
To clasp the cross, the cloister, and the veil.
Some weeks previous to the time at which my last chapter terminates, I had received a letter from an old friend, requesting me to inform him if any dwelling in our vicinity was for sale, as he was anxious to leave the city, and bring his family to a quieter home. I answered his inquiries satisfactorily, and now daily expected him to arrive, and make final arrangements for his removal.
He came at last, bringing with him his only son, a boy somewhat older than Theresa. Gerald Brandon was pale and feeble from recent illness, and I persuaded his father to leave him with me, until his new residence was prepared to receive its inmates. He gladly assented, and accordingly returned to town, while Gerald remained at the parsonage. The next two months were among the happiest my memory recalls; and they were the last untroubled ones Theresa passed in her secluded home. From their threshold she glided to a new life – to that conflict of will and purpose, that tempest of impulse and disappointment which finally subdued her spirit and wearied out her existence. But as yet all was serene and full of promise; and the golden hues of her sunny dreams invested our simple pleasures with varied and poetic interest. My young guest was a gentle, reflective boy of more than ordinary capabilities, but enfeebled by ill-health, and a victim to the lassitude which frequently follows protracted bodily suffering. He was too placid and pensive for his age, and his mind, though refined and harmonious, had nothing of that restless, energetic brilliancy which sparkled through Theresa's thoughts. He, however, eagerly participated in her accustomed studies, and contributed his share to our literary recreations. I sometimes looked on the two with that involuntary wish for the power of prophecy which so often rises upon us, and which in great mercy we are denied, and would frequently strive to shadow forth the destiny of beings who were now reveling in the brief, bright interval between childhood and the world. Beautiful era! time of star and flower, when the "young moon is on the horizon's verge," and the young heart, lovelier still, seems on the brink of rapture, and hallows existence with its own unshadowed and seraphic light. We have cause to be grateful that this episode is transient, that reality contradicts its hopes, for could its illusions last, who would pause to think of heaven, with so much of enchanting fulfillment around us here.
It was with instinctive pride that I felt my favorite's mental superiority to her companion, and noticed the genuine admiration with which Gerald acknowledged it. He was astonished at her variety of acquirement, her daring originality of opinion, and her unstudied readiness of expression. He was gratified, and it may be, flattered, by the disinterested solicitude she evinced for his enjoyment, and the readiness with which she discarded any scheme of amusement in which his health prevented his participation. There is a period in youth when the affections feel as a strong necessity, the desire for sympathy, when love is yet a stranger, and friendship is as intense as passion. Dearer than any after friend, is the one who first fills this yearning vacancy; and though as time wears on, and separation follows, that tie may be broken never to be re-knit, there is a halo around it still, and it is made almost holy by the blended tints of hope and trust, and tenderness, that, with reflected light, shine back upon its memory.
It was the evening before Theresa's departure, and we were all assembled at the cottage. It was impossible to feel very sad, where the majority were so eager and fraught with hope, and yet the mother's countenance was full of anxiety for her child. Little Amy sat on her sister's knee, and Theresa, in her graphic language, was relating some romantic history of her own invention, while Mrs. Germaine and myself spoke of her. The parent's solicitude was altogether physical; she feared only that Theresa would be sick, or that she would encounter some of the thousand accidents and evils, whose spectres haunt us upon the eve of a first separation. I thought it kinder to be silent as to my own very different misgivings, and to dwell only on the encouraging part of the prospect. There might be nothing to dread, after all, and it was possibly only our unwillingness to part with Theresa, that thus assumed to itself the tormenting shape of inquietude.
During our conversation, which was carried on in an under tone, little Amy had fallen asleep, and after carefully placing her on the couch, and kissing the fair face of the slumberer, that shone like a faultless picture from its frame of golden curls, Theresa adjourned with Gerald to the porch. It was a perfect evening, and the rays of the full moon illumined the little portico, throwing on its floor, in fanciful mosaic, the fantastic shadows of the vines which draperied the pillars, and lighting up with its spiritual radiance, the earnest countenances of the youthful friends. Gerald looked more than usually pale in the blanching beams, and Theresa's gaze was sad and tearful.
"You will forget us all, Theresa," said the boy; "you will find elsewhere gayer and dearer companions; you will be praised and flattered, and it will be several years before you will be stationary here again."
"Do you remember the book we read together but a few days since?" she answered, "and which says there is no such thing as forgetting possible to the mind?"
"Well, but at least you may grow indifferent," persisted Gerald, already betraying manhood's perverseness in suspicion, "at least you may grow indifferent, and that is even worse than forgetfulness."
"Far worse," answered Theresa, "I would rather a thousand times be wholly forgotten, than know that the heart which loved me had grown cold and careless. But, Gerald, you are my first friend, the only one of my own age I have ever known, and how can I lose the recollection of all we have thought and hoped together? And then I shall be too constantly occupied to form other ties, for I intend to study incessantly, and to return here all, mentally, that my friends can wish me."
"Are you not that already; I, for one, do not desire you to change."
"You will alter your flattering opinion, mon ami, if I can by application realize the bright pictures my ambition paints. I shall be so much happier when I have tested myself; for now, all is untried, the present is restless, and the future perplexing. It is so difficult for me to curb my impatience, to remember that our progressive path must be trodden step by step, it may be, through thorns and temptations. Patience is the golden rule of talent, the indispensable companion of success; for the 'worm may patiently creep to the height where the mountain-eagle has rested.' The hardest task for genius to learn is, through toiling, to hope on, and though baffled, never to despond."
Her face flushed with her own eagerness as she spoke, and Gerald looked on her with mingled admiration and want of comprehension, and something of that pity with which boyhood is prone to regard the wildness of girlish aspirations. It was with hopes and tears united, that Theresa bade me farewell; and as I turned away to seek my quiet home, the old feeling of desolation and loneliness, which interest in my favorite had long dissipated, returned upon me with its depressing weight. Our walk to the parsonage was taken in unbroken silence, for Gerald, like myself, was busy with the future – to him a smiling world of compensation and promise, to me, the silent land of fears and shadows. A whole year was to elapse before Theresa's return to us, and in the interval she engaged to write every week, either to her mother or myself.
For more than an hour that evening I sat beside my window, looking on the serene prospect around me, and endeavoring to lay something of that external stillness to the restlessness of my disturbing fancies. All around was spiritualized by the moonlight; the trees on the lawn threw long shadows on the grass, and far away, in their mysterious and majestic silence, stood the eternal mountains; like gigantic watchers, they kept their vigil over the placid scene beneath – the vigil of untold centuries. Cloudless, unsympathizing, changeless, they had no part in the busy drama of human experience their loftiness overlooked, and now they loomed with shadowy outline, through the sanctifying light, habitants alike of earth and sky.
I anticipated tidings from Theresa with that interest which slight occurrences lend a life whose stirring events are few.
To me, she engaged to record her thoughts and impressions as they came, and to be to me what, under similar circumstances she would have been, whose sweet face for a few years brightened my life, and who now sleeps, in her childish beauty, by her mother's side.
THERESA'S FIRST LETTER
"You will have learned from my letter to my mother, my kind friend, all the little details of my journey and safe arrival at my destination. I felt as if some of my visions of romance were realized, when this beautifully adorned place, in its strange and solemn stillness, stood before me. All the grounds surrounding the convent-buildings are highly cultivated and tastefully improved, presenting a vivid contrast between the wild luxuriance of nature, and the formal, artificial life within these cold, stern walls. Several of the nuns, with downcast eyes and thoughtful steps, were taking their monotonous exercise in the paths through the shrubbery; and shall I confess that I looked with mingled doubt and envy upon those dark-robed figures – doubt, if the restlessness of humanity can thus be curbed into repose, and envy of that uninterrupted peace, if, indeed, it may be gained. Strange seem this existence of sacrifice, this voluntary abandonment of life's aims and more extended duties, this repelling, crushing routine of penance and ceremony, with which, in the very midst of activity, and in the bloom of energy, vain mortals strive to put off the inevitable fetters of mortality. Doubtless, many, from long habit, have grown familiar with this vegetative, unbroken seclusion, and accustomed to struggle with tenderness, and conquer impulse, have ceased to feel affection, and rarely recall the friends of their busier days – sad consummation of womanhood's least enviable lot.
"But I believe it is, in all sincerity, from self-delusion, not from deception, that these women, many of them in the freshness of youth, separate themselves from the wide privileges of their sex, and contract their hearts into the exclusive and narrow bounds of a convent's charities. What mental conflicts must have been theirs, before, from the alluring gloss of expectation, they could turn to embrace a career like this. Some, perhaps, believed the possibility of winning tranquillity by shutting out the temptation of the world, believed that dust might be spiritualized, and the mind, debarred from its natural tendencies, taught to dream only of heaven. Others have sought the cloister as a refuge for hearts that loved too well, and memories all too faithful. God help such! – for this is no place to forget. And it may be, that after years of painful self-control and depressing experience, some here have gradually attained the conviction that their efforts are vain, their yearnings not here to be fulfilled – what, then, must solitude be to them but an enduring sorrow? It is too late to retrieve the past – the fatal vows have been spoken – those frowning walls are impassable – and the dark folds of that solemn veil are evermore between the penitents and human sympathy. Never may their footsteps tread the free earth again, save within those still and mocking limits; never will the bright, rewarding world of social ties dawn upon their languid gaze, though, alas! its beauty will flash upon their thoughts, through the loneliness of the silent cell, perhaps even amid penance and prayer. I look with profound, inexpressible interest on these sisters, in their ungraceful, but romance-hallowed costume, and wish, as I watch them, that I could read something of what the past has been to each, and trace the various motives that led to this irrevocable fate. This monotonous life has all the glow of novelty for me; and I ponder with inexhaustible interest, and blended reverence and pity on the hidden moral conflict, continually occurring among beings who strive to taste angels' pleasures while escaping human duties, and are reminded of the folly of such attempts, by the perpetual presence of temptation, and all the self-reproach, regret, and disappointment which, Heaven be thanked! the angels never feel. I can scarcely tell, as yet, how I shall like learning here. My studies have always been such a pleasure to me, with you, that it appears strange to associate them with strangers. I am resolved to devote much time to drawing and miniature painting, for which you know I had always a penchant, and in the course of a month or two I shall commence the study of German. What a world of pleasure is before me. Will you not love me better, if I return to you an artist, brim full of German legends? All that I hope and aspire to, leads to that question – will these acquisitions render me more beloved?"
"Theresa is too ambitious, too restless," said Gerald, as he finished the perusal of this letter, "she will only render herself discontented and conspicuous by this wild, idle desire for superiority."
I felt somewhat provoked at his querulous words, for in my partial eyes Theresa seldom erred, and I knew this solicitude for mental progress, though as yet vague and undirected, was inseparable from her active and energetic intellect. But Gerald's opinions were common ones with his sex, and he coldly censured when away from their attractions, the very traits of character which, when present, involuntarily fascinated his imagination. And this is an ingratitude which almost inevitably falls to the share of a gifted woman. Unfortunately, genius does not shield its possessor from defects of character; and her very superiority in raising her above the level of the many, renders her failings more evident, and those who are forced mentally to admire, are frequently the first morally to condemn. The following are extracts from Theresa's letters, written at various intervals during the first year of her residence at the convent; and they will perhaps serve to reveal something of the rapid development of her mind, with the self-forgetfulness and ambition so peculiarly blended in her nature. She is the only one I have ever seen who possessed extreme enthusiasm without selfishness, and the strong desire to excel, without envy. There was a harmony in her being as rare as it was winning; and while many instances of her childish generosity and spontaneous disinterestedness rise on my memory, I feel almost bitterness at the recollection of how unworthily her pure heart was appreciated, and how sad was the recompense of all she suffered.
"I am happy, my kind friend, happier than I believed it possible for me to be, when away from those I love. But I study incessantly, and in acquiring and hoping, I have no time left for regret. When I recall you, it is not repiningly, but with a thousand desires for your approval, and increased anxiety to become all you can wish. You will, perhaps, consider this vanity; but, indeed, that would be unjust, for it is in all humility, with a painful consciousness of my own deficiencies that I strive so eagerly to grow wiser and better. Surely it is not vanity, to yearn to merit tenderness!.. You ask if I have made any new friends. No; and I can scarcely tell why. There are several here whose appearance has interested me – and you know how rapturously I admire personal attractions; but I feel a reserve I can neither conquer nor explain. Friendship seems to me too holy and enduring to be lightly bestowed, and yet I desire with inexpressible earnestness, to find some one of my own age who would love and comprehend me – some mind in whose mirror I could trace an image of my own. I have gained something like a fulfillment of this wish in Gerald; but he is naturally less enthusiastic than I am, and of course cannot enter into the fervor of my expectations. He thinks them vain an idle – and so, in truth, they may be; but only their irrevocable disappointment will ever convince me of their folly… I have been painting a great deal, beside my regular exercises, for my own amusement; I take such delight in testing my power to reflect the visible charm of beauty, and in endeavoring, however faintly, to idealize humanity. Among other efforts, I have finished a miniature of one of the young sisters here, whose sad, placid face, seemed to sketch itself upon my memory. Of course, the likeness was drawn without her knowledge – she has put away from her thoughts all such vanities. I often look on the picture, which is scarcely more tranquil than the original; and I wish I could speak a word of welcome sympathy to one who is so young, and yet so sorrowful. I was much touched, a few days since, by accidentally witnessing an interview between this nun, whose convent name is Cecelia, and her sister. It seems that she had taken the vows in opposition to the wishes and counsel of all her friends, having forsaken a widowed mother and an only sister for spiritual solitude and the cloister. I was copying an exquisite engraving of the Madonna, which adorns the apartment allotted to visiters, when a young lady entered, and desired to see her sister. The nun came, but not beyond the grating which bounds one side of the room. Those bars – signs of the heart's prison – were between beings who from infancy had been undivided, whose pleasures and pains through life had been inseparable, and who were now severed by a barrier impassable as the grave. They contrasted strongly, these two sisters, so nearly the same age, so different in their hopes for the future. The guest wept constantly, and her words, spoken in a loud tone, were broken by bursts of grief; but the other was composed, almost to coldness – there was no evidence of distress on her marble cheek, and her large, gray eyes, were quiet in their gaze. She had evidently learned to curb emotion and regret – the past for her was a sealed book, with all its remembrances; she was a woman without her sex's loveliest impulses – a sister without tenderness, a daughter without gratitude. They parted, as they had met, each unconvinced, each grieving for the other – the visiter returned to her holy filial duties, the devotee to her loneliness. My friend, on which of these sisters do the angels in heaven look down most rejoicingly? This scene made me sorrowful, as every thing does which destroys an illusion. I had entertained such romantic ideas of life in the cloister, it seemed so tempting to me in its rest, its spirituality; and now I realize that we have no right to such rest, that it is not ours to shrink from the duties, to shun the penalties, to crush the affections of humanity – and my visions of lonely happiness have passed away pour toujours. If ever I could be induced to forsake a world that now appears to me so rich in promise; if ever I am numbered among the tried in spirit, and broken in heart, some active solace must be mine, not this fearful leisure for thought and remembrance. My lot is to be a restless one; and whatever else the future may hold for me, I know, in the spirit of prophecy, it will bestow nothing of repose… You tell me my little sister grows every day more lovely. I can readily believe it. There is something very fascinating in the style of her childish beauty, something that appeals to tenderness and seeks for love – and she is always the reality that prompts my dreams of angels. Is it not unwise, my friend, to hold the gift of personal beauty of little value, when it thus involuntarily commands affection, and can win the world's charity for many faults?"
I know not if these disjointed scraps have interest for others, but I have recorded them, because to me they recall the young writer's glowing enthusiasm, and evince the confident hopefulness which is one of the most common traits of mental excellence. Without being vain, she had yet no fears for herself, no doubt of the successful exercise of the powers whose stirring presence she felt. All that seemed necessary to her was opportunity; and she possessed the faith our good God gives to youth, and whose passing away is one of the sorrows of age.
The time appointed for her return home had now arrived, and her mother's anxiety to see her was scarcely greater than my own. In the meanwhile, Mr. Brandon's new residence – the handsomest in our vicinity – had been completed, and his family was permanently located among us. His domestic circle consisted of Gerald, a daughter, about Theresa's age, and a maiden lady, the sister of his wife, who, since Mrs. Brandon's death, had done the household honors. Gerald had been, from the first, a constant visiter at the parsonage, and he now participated in our solicitude to welcome our darling back. About sunset, on the day of Theresa's return, I directed my steps toward the cottage, and I was but halfway to my destination, when I saw her coming to meet me. I could never be mistaken in her light, rapid walk, whose movements were full of grace. Not for many a long, sad year, had a reception so affectionate as hers been given me; and her greeting brought tears to my old eyes, and called up painful memories to my heart. In appearance she had greatly improved; her slight figure had rounded into more womanly proportions, and her motions were full of the wild, unstudied gracefulness that had always characterized her. There was about her a fascination I cannot explain, a something independent of externals – a witchery to be felt but not defined. Perhaps it was the visible influence of mental gifts, the reflection of that purity of heart and mind which impressed itself on all her words and actions.
Let it not, however, be imagined, that because in my fond remembrance I have lingered long upon Theresa's many virtues, I was ignorant of her faults. They were those inseparable from her temperament; an impetuosity which frequently misled her judgment, and a confidence in her own beliefs, a reliance on her own will, that nothing but an appeal to her affections could ever subdue. She was an instance of that sad truth, that our defects shape our destinies; that one failing may exert over our lot a more potent influence than many excellencies, and may mar the brilliancy of our moral picture by a single shadow, that shall darken it all. In after life, when trial and suffering pressed wearily upon her, all her griefs might have been traced back to the influence of faults, which in her childhood were not sufficiently developed to seem of consequence, or to merit rebuke. To us she was so loving and complying, that the less favorable traits of her nature were lost to our eyes in the brightness of her better endowments. Like all poetic persons, she had various fancies and caprices; but hers were all pure in purpose, and imparted a charm to her restless being. Even her tenderness had its fantasies, and lavished itself wastefully without thought or reason. Her attachment to her sister was remarkable in its tone, blending anxiety with its profound and impassioned tide. She would speak to me of Amy, of her childish loveliness, her gentle disposition, her appealing trustfulness, until tears would start to her eyes, and the future seemed painfully distant to one whose onward gaze had painted it with fulfillments. There was nothing sweet and lovable in life that she did not connect with Amy's hereafter. Alas! it was well for her she could not foresee that future happiness was to be won by the sacrifice of her own.
