1 10 5 https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/4347/archive/files/8d1e40a1949e403067ee73bd9acd3c85.pdf?Expires=1781740800&Signature=NrBnHg%7EwBnFhdjARZpm5cyncxFNOzP3puZvDpXpX-P4VqrmrwwK6ir08bYfZuupVq9BiHO1GiJ7VAx7H3EfwBQXb8FS00Ml7avplsBm-wcWM2Tr9yEHvw%7EpNjGVEosL6gDulXx-m2lBd59HUPDUbt5r%7EaiTPP60koUwRQl04r1s9m2X96wX919UtF0j8L45bKV9EUVSN3n-X8gVq3f2Z0FeIC1TVoF%7EyEDmJ0k-2JuLNOTZSv1wgCEF0uClb6usPA3Rbg1O0uTGUP%7E0mjSv3P-qnf75K%7E2r2Afg4H9aint8Kp0yokUkT3xs4ztpdyXEYWOt3l8pXCx3ao7LL5FuP2Q__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 9318956458123efb124f4d2a4096f467 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1840 Document A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text. Text Any textual data included in the document. THE DEFORMED BOY “THE great Basil mentions a certain art of drawing many doves by anointing the wings of a few with a fragrant ointment, and so sending them abroad, that by the fragrancy of the ointment they may allure others unto the house whereof they are domestics.” We would borrow a hint from the artifice of the ingenious bird-catcher, and record, for the benefit of some of our young friends, a few acts of particular goodness that have chanced to fall under our own observation, in the hope that their love of virtue may be augmented by contemplating its lovely aspects and certain results. The example of gratitude which we are about to record, though it is derived from one of the very limited means and in humble life, will, it is hoped, serve to illustrate the duty so often and so ably enforced by our benevolent philosopher Franklin, the duty of looking upon our fellow-beings as all children of one parent—members of one family; so that, if we receive a favour from one individual which we cannot return, we should bestow it on some other member of the family, and thus, to use the doctor’s own expression, keep it “going round.” [10] Much occurs to us to say on the uses and felicity of a grateful temper, but we are so well acquainted with the habits of our young friends, that we know they will skip the general remarks to get at the story, as nimbly as a little squirrel will leap over a heap of rubbish to grasp a single nut. To the story then. In one of the small cities of Hudson there lived a Mrs. Aikin; a lady eminently blessed with affluence and happiness, and one who gratefully acknowledged the truth “freely ye have received,” and faithfully obeyed the admonition “freely give.” On a bright but bitter cold morning in January, Mrs. Aikin’s family were assembled in the parlour to breakfast; a fine fire of hickory blazed on the hearth, and seemed to crackle defiance to the terrors of the cold, if indeed there was a crevice through which the cold could enter this snug and nicely calked parlour. The family had just risen from their morning devotions; the servant was bearing in a tea-tray loaded with the hissing coffee-pot, tempting sausages, and a plate of buckwheat pancakes, when a violent ring at the door, thrice repeated, called everyone’s attention. “Run, William, and open the door quickly,” said Mrs. Aikin; “I would not keep a dog on the outside of my door this morning.” William obeyed and immediately returned, followed by a little fellow who ran, or, rather, waddled in after him. The child had short legs, a body disproportionately large, and a hump on his back. His head, though rather overgrown, was well formed, his hair light and curling, his skin very fair [11] his eyes a deep clear blue, and his whole expression that of infantine sweetness and innocence. Such a head and face surmounting a deformed body looked somewhat like a beautiful fruit on a gnarled stalk. The boy seemed almost stiffened with the cold; but, regardless of himself, and apparently impelled by instinct, he ran up to Mrs. Aikin, and, grasping her gown, he said, with a voice so tremulous as to be almost inaudible, “Oh, ma’am, do come and see what ails mother!” “Why, who is your mother, child? And who are you?” asked Mrs. Aikin. “Oh, do come and see ma’am—now—quick. I am afraid mother will burn the house up, for she is lighting the fire with all our clothes; she does not act like mother; do—do come and see what ails her.” Little Lucy Aikin, a rosy-cheeked, kind-hearted little girl, was at first impatient at the delay of her breakfast; but she soon forgot herself, and, apparently with the expectation of comforting the child, took a sausage, and, wrapping it nicely in a buckwheat cake, she offered it to him. “No, no,” said he, bursting into cries that expressed impatience and grief, “no, I am not hungry. I was hungry last night, and we were all hungry. Mother said so; and she began to cry, but she isn’t crying now!” “There is something very urgent in this case,” said Mrs. Aikin, turning to her husband. “Let William serve you and the children, and I will go with the child.” Mr. Aikin assented, for he perceived the boy’s distress was deep and unaffected—how should it be [12] otherwise! he was not, apparently, more than five or six years old. Mrs. Aikin threw on her cloak, and, taking the child’s hand, he led her through a lane, which, running by the corner of her house, formed the communication between the street she lived upon and a street in the rear of that, where there were several one-story houses, or rather hovels, which had been erected as temporary habitations for the poorest class of people. Into one of the most wretched of these Mrs. Aikin followed her little conductor, and there she beheld a spectacle of misery that sufficiently explained the poor child’s distress. His mother sat on the hearth, with a pale, half-famished-looking infant in her arms, crying piteously, and seeking nourishment at her breast, where, alas! there was none. She was deliberately tearing up cotton frock, and throwing it, piece by piece, on the few embers that lay in the fireplace. She rose on seeing Mrs. Aikin, as if from habitual good manners; and after looking round for a chair, she smiled and said, “Oh! I remember, they took my chairs; but pray be seated, ma’am. I have been trying,” she continued, “to kindle a fire to warm my baby and me; but my stuff is so light it goes out directly, and we don’t seem to get warm, ma’am.” Mrs. Aikin perceived at a single glance at the poor woman’s burning cheeks and parched lips, that she was in the delirium of a fever. She approached her, and offered to take the child. “Oh no,” she said, “not my baby; you know, when they took all the rest, they promised not to take my baby.” [13] “But let me try to quiet her for you.” “No, I thank you ma’am; she is only fretting for her breakfast.” She put the infant again to her breast; the child seized it with the eagerness of starvation, and then redoubled its cries. “I make but a poor nurse,” said the mother, smiling faintly; “I think it does not agree with me to live without food. Do you think that can be reason my baby does not thrive, ma’am?’ and she raised her eyes to Mrs. Aikin, as if appealing for her opinion. The tears of compassion were streaming down Mrs. Aikin’s cheeks, and the poor woman, apparently from pure sympathy, burst into loud sobs. The little boy threw himself on a bed in a corner of the room, and, burying his head in the bedclothes, tried thus to suppress his cries. Mrs. Aikin, aware that the wants of these sufferers would not justify a moment’s delay of the succor they needed, called the boy to her, and despatched him to her husband with a note, which she hastily wrote with a pencil on the back of a letter. While he was gone she had leisure to observe the extreme wretchedness of the apartment, in which there was not an article of furniture save a straw bed and its scanty covering. There were shreds of the garments strewed about the floor, the “light stuff” the poor crazed woman had been burning to warm her infant. “Have you been long sick, my friend?” she asked, with the faint hope of obtaining a rational answer. “Sick! Sick!” replied the mother; “yes, a good while—I have been sick a trifle—the intermittent and the typhus—but I believe I am getting the better of it all, for yesterday I felt quite hungry.” [14] “And did you take anything?” asked Mrs. Aikin. “Oh yes,” she answered, drawing near to Mrs. Aikin, and whispering with an air of great self-complacency, “I did indeed take something—all I had in the house-an excellent thing to blunt the edge of one’s appetite—laudanum—you know ma’am, it is doctor’s stuff and the doctors know how to cure an appetite.” “God help you, poor woman!” exclaimed Mrs. Aikin. “God help me!” reiterated the poor creature, with a piercing cry; “there is no help for me;” and she sunk on the side of the bed and wept freely. Mrs. Aikin was sensible that in this returning consciousness of her miseries there was a dawning of reason; she knew that her tears were a natural expression of feeling, and would afford her the quickest relief; and she permitted them to flow on without interrupting her. In the mean time Mr. Aikin arrived, accompanied by a woman-servant laden with necessaries and refreshments, and a boy with a barrow of wood; a fire was kindled; nourishment was provided for the baby, and food offered to the deformed boy, who, now that he saw a relief at hand for his mother, ate ravenously. Cordials were administered to the mother; a physician was summoned, and a nurse provided for her; and, in short, everything was done that could be done, where there was benevolence to devise and ability to execute. The lapse of a few days found Mrs. Shepard (for that was the poor woman’s name) quite recovered from the delirium into which she had been [15] driven by sickness and extreme misery. She related to her benefactress the few particulars of her melancholy history. It was not an uncommon one, and we shall not detail it at length, for we would not cloud the cheerful faces of our young readers with unnecessary sadness. Mrs. Shepard was the daughter of a respectable farmer; the youngest of a numerous family. She was married when very young to one of those miserable beings who are always meeting with disappointments and bad luck, those sure plagues of the idle and shiftless. Her husband had health, a good trade, and abundance of friends; but, as the proverb says, “Who can help those who won’t help themselves?” Shepard changed one branch of business for another; he moved from place to place, but he never left behind him the faults that caused the failure of all his enterprises. He went in the beaten track from idleness to intemperance and to bad company; and finally, lost to all sense of duty, he abandoned his wife and little ones in a strange place, after a sheriff had stripped his wretched dwelling of the little wreck of furniture he possessed. But Mrs. Shepard was not left to perish. In her greatest extremity, when there seemed no help, and sickness and the sight of her starving children had driven her to distraction, Heaven directed to her relief a kind and efficient friend. Mrs. Aikin’s discretion and good sense equaled her benevolence. She thought that as God is his kind providence had seen fit to exempt her from the sore evils of life, she was bound to testify her gratitude by doing all in her power to mitigate the sufferings of others. [16] She remembered that our Saviour was familiar with our sorrows and acquainted with our griefs; and as it was not with her passing desire, but the rule of her life, to imitate him, she did not content herself with sending a servant with an inquiry or a gift to the poor, or with subscribing to charitable societies, but she visited the sick and the afflicted, and listened patiently to their very long, and often, to her as well as to others, very tiresome stories. She would enter with benevolent sympathy into the history of their cares and wants, and would even forget she had nerves while she gave her ear to the details of a loathsome sickness; in short, she never forgot the common people who have minds and hearts, and that often a more essential charity is done by fainting an influence over them than can be effected by pecuniary relief. We entreat our young friends to believe that, they will have treasures of kindness to impart far more valuable than Aladdin’s lamp. Fortunatus’ cap, or any gift of fay or fairy. But we are digressing from our story—not uselessly, however, if we are strengthened the love of goodness in the breast of a single reader. Mrs. Aikin visited her humble friend every day till she was restored to comfortable health. It was then necessary that some means should be adopted for her permanent relief. She could be received with her children into the almshouse, but she preferred making any struggle to being dependant on public charity; “for that,” she said to Mrs. Aikin, “was what nobody took pleasure in giving, and no one was thankful for receiving.” [17] After many consultations with her benefactress it was determined that she should hire a small cheap apartment, and take in sewing. Mrs. Aikin promised her constant aid, and performed more than she promised; and Mr. Aikin, who was one the aldermen of the city, obtained for her a small weekly stipend from the corporation, who find this a much better mode of aiding the industrious poor than removing them from the excitements and pleasures of their own homes to public institutions. Mrs. Shepard’s health was infirm, and her means were scanty, but she was so diligent and economical that she maintained her children with decency. With the present she was not only contented, but grateful; the past she had borne with fortitude and patience. “Many a time,” she said to Mrs. Aikin, “when I have been reduced almost to despair, those words, ‘Put thy trust in the Lord, he will never leave nor forsake thee,’ have come to my remembrance, and I have taken courage and gone on again. When Richard, my poor little crooked boy, was born, I had two children older than he: they were both sick with the whooping-cough; the baby, that is, Dick, took it; I was myself in a weakly way; we had none of us the necessary medicines nor food; both my boys died; my poor baby was neglected; he mastered the whooping-cough, and fell into the rickets, which ended in making him the little misshapen thing you see. But it seems as if God had tempered the wind to the shorn lamb, for a better, or, in the main a happier child there never was than Dicky.” The good mother was not blinded, as fond moth- [18] ers sometimes are, by partiality to unfortunate children; for Richard, or Dicky as he was familiarly, or rather Ducky as he was most commonly called, in an allusion to his short legs, Ducky was a perfect philosopher. Not a single crook of his little body had twisted his temper, or given one wrong turn to his disposition. How much of his philosophy he owed to the faithful care of his mother, we leave to be estimated by those of our young readers who are so blessed as to possess parents who are continually watching over their morals and happiness. Mrs. Shepard was a poor woman, but she had received a good common education, the birthright alike of rich and poor in New-England, where she was brought up. She seldom found time to read a book herself; but devoted mothers can do that for their children which they cannot do for themselves; and Mrs. Shepard found, or made time to teach Richard to read before he could walk. She would tie her baby into a chair beside her while she was washing, or ironing, or mending, and, at the same time, teach Dicky to repeat hymns and stories in verse which she had learned in her childhood. It was really a pleasing, and, at the same time, an affecting sight to see the little fellow, deprived as he was of the of the active pleasures usual at his age, sitting curled up on his chair, with his head unnaturally drawn down on his bosom, fix his bright, eager eye on his mother, repeat the words after her without missing a syllable, and chuckle with delight when he had mastered a couplet. Oh! who, when they see calamities thus mitigated, can help recalling that sentiment of [19] Scripture, “He remembereth our infirmities and pititeth us, even as a father pitieth his children.” But how did Dicky escape the fretfulness of temper which so often attend deformity? Surely not by learning hymns. No; though this occupation lightened many an hour, we cannot attribute such power to it. He had naturally a sweet and cheerful temper, but this would probably have given place to the irritability that so often attends and aggravates disease and privation but for the unceasing watchfulness and patience of his mother. If he ever got into a pet (as what child does not sometimes?), her rebuke was mildly spoken; and if the pet amounted to a passion, it was soon subdued by her firm, tranquil manner. The sound of her low gentle, and tender voice operated like oil thrown on the stormy waves, which is said to smooth their surface wherever it touches them. Mrs. Aikin suggested to Richard’s mother that she might give him a useful occupation by teaching him to knit. She immediately improved the hint; Dick was delighted with his new employment, and soon became such a master of the knitting-needle that he might have rivalled almost any old woman in the country. He was sitting one day on his mother’s door-step, protected from the sun by the shadow of a fine elm-tree, finishing a pair of suspenders which Mrs. Aiken had bespoken for her son, when a company of boys came marching in military procession up the street. The young soldiers were equipped with wooden muskets; their hats were garnished with cocks’ tails for plumes; half a dozen pocket-handkerchiefs tied together, decked with white paper stars and [20] attached to a stick, formed their flag, their ”star-spangled banner,” and was as proudly carried by its bearer as more magnificent colours have been; a tin-kettle served for “a spirit-stirring drum,” and a “shrill fife” was blown by a sturdy little fellow, whose lungs seemed as inexhaustible as the windbags of old Æolus. When they arrived opposite to Mrs. Shepard’s door, a proposal was made to halt under the elm-tree till their captain, Frank Hardy, should join them. “And, in the mean time, gentlemen,” called out mischievous little urchin in the rear, “let us give a salute to Miss Ducky Shepard, knitter to the light-infantry.” “Hurrah for Miss Ducky!” shouted the boys, and the soldiers lowered their muskets, the standard-bearer waved his colours, and the little drummer beat a flourish. Dicky had at first entered into the sport, but now his countenance fell, he resumed his knitting which he had laid down, but his eyes were blurred with tears, his hands trembled, and his stitches dropped. “Ah!” cried out the lieutenant, Miss Ducky don’t like your salute; never mind, Dick, Miss Ducky you shall be no longer. Gentlemen, fellow-soldiers, all who are for electing Miss Ducky captain, pro tem. will please hold up their right hands.” Fifty right hands were instantly elevated,” and another shout of “Hurrah for Captain Dick!” made the welkin ring. As soon as the sounds had ceased, “Advance, Corporal Seation,” said the lieutenant, “and help me escort the captain to the head of his company.” The two boys took the unresisting child in their [21] arms and placed him at the head of their corps. “Turn out your toes captain,” said the lieutenant, touching Dicky’s short bow legs with his musket; “there, gentlemen, is a fine leg for a march!” “Hold up your head, captain,” said the corporal; “there’s a captain to scare the enemy!” But poor little Dick could not hold up his head, and the tears that he had manfully repressed now gushed from his eyes and rolled down to his bosom. At this critical moment there was a sudden movement in the ranks. “What is all this? said the real captain, Frank Hardy, springing on his lieutenant and corporal, and laying them on their marrow-bones. “Coward’s play, boys -- coward’s play; here, Dick, my little man, take my hand; brush away your tears, and I’ll see you righted.” Dick grasped the friendly hand that was extended to him, and Frank, after replacing him on the doorstep, instituted an inquiry into this cruel sport. The eyes of the company were now turned to their popular commander, and all were preparing to trim their vessels whichever way he should cause the tide to set. He soon satisfied himself that the offence demanded an exemplary punishment; and, ordering his company to form into a hollow square, he made them a speech, full of eloquence and feeling, on the merits of Dicky and their own demerit, or, rather, the demerit of their ringleaders, for he skillfully contrived to make them the scapegoats, and to bind the offences of all the culprits on their backs. After the speech he proposed that the lieutenant and corporal should be degraded from their high command to the private ranks, and should be sentenced to pay a fine to Dicky of six cents each. [22] The sentence was passed by acclamation; the captain saw the decision enforced. The money which had been carefully husbanded for a treat after the day’s drill, was sullenly delivered into the commander’s hand, and reluctantly received from him by Dicky; reluctantly, for out little simple friend did not quite comprehend how “might made right;” and his feelings had been too deeply wounded to admit of consolation in this form. He was, however, in a degree comforted by the interposition of Captain Frank in his behalf; he felt that it conferred consequence on him, for Frank Hardy was a universal favourite among the boys; stout and active, good-humoured and kind-hearted, he was the champion of all the oppressed, and the corrector of all the wrongs in his neighborhood. When the company marched away, poor Richard’s sorrows broke out afresh, and, running to his mother’s room, he threw the knitting on the floor, and said, in a voice half suppressed with sobs, “I never will touch that work again.” “Why, what is the matter with you Dicky?” asked his mother; “I never saw you in such a flurry.” Richard recounted, as well as he was able, the story of his wrong, and Mrs. Shepard listened with all a mother’s patience; and, when he concluded, she tried in vain to remove the impression from his mind that it was his “girl’s-work” that had been the cause of his mortification. “Hurrah for Miss Ducky, knitter to the light-infantry,” still sounded his ears, and drowned every argument she could urge. Shame, that most unpleasant feeling, was ever after most indissolubly associated [23] with his work. The most obedient of all good boys, he would resume his knitting in compliance with his mother’s commands, but he never took it up voluntarily--never again relished it. Thus was this poor little fellow deprived of an innocent and useful pastime by a company of unfeeling boys. Perhaps we ought rather to say inconsiderate, for young people are more apt to be thoughtless than cruel; and we believe that those who laughed loudest and longest at Dicky’s drool little figure, would have wept with the ingenuous sorrow of childhood if they could have known the pang their laugh inflicted. Our young readers may have heard of the philosopher’s stone; there is an art that far exceeds the power ascribed to that gem of the alchemist: the art by which a good person extracts instruction from every event, however adverse, is certainly superior to that which transmutes base metal into gold. The incident we have related made Mrs. Shepard fully aware of Richard’s susceptibility to the mortifications to which his deformity rendered him liable, and henceforward she constantly endeavoured to arm him with fortitude. It is unnecessary to recount all she said and did to accomplish this purpose. Perhaps it would not make much figure in print, for Mrs. Shepard was so quiet and simple in her way, that one would as soon expect (provided there was neither experience nor knowledge on the subject) a tree to grow from an acorn an any great effect to proceed from her efforts. She had good materials to work on, docile disposition and sweet temper; and so completely successful [24] was she, that Richard, as he grew older, bore all sorts of jibes and jokes without wincing, His sweet, enduring temper disarmed mischief of its sting, and converted ridicule into respect. At the Lancaster school, where he was monitor of a class composed of boys of every disposition, some much older, and all a head taller than himself, he was treated with as much deference as if he had been six feet high, and had had the limbs of Apollo. Since the memorable day of the training, he had maintained a constant friendly intercourse with his champion, Frank Hardy. Dick would do anything on earth to serve Frank, and Frank was sword and shield to Dick. But, notwithstanding this strict alliance between them, they were in some respects widely different. Unfortunately, those good principles had not been instilled into Frank that prompted Richard to do right, as well from duty as from impulse. Frank’s mother was a widow, and he was her only child; and she indulged him excessively, or restrained him unreasonably, according to the humour she happened to be in, without any regard to the right of the case or his ultimate good. Frank was what everybody calls a warm, good-hearted fellow with a bright, sunny face, and a merry disposition, that won his way to all hearts. He loved pleasure extravagantly, as was natural, for he was on all occasions contriver of the sport and master of the revels. On one fourth of July, he had planned a sailing excursion to a village in the vicinity. Each member of the party was to contribute half a dollar to the expenses, and poor Frank was in utter consternation when, on apply- [25] ing to his mother, in the confident expectation of obtaining the money, she denied it to him. He entreated and expostulated, but all in vain; she was out of humour, and if she had been a Midas she would not have given him the half dollar. Frank left her disappointed and mortified; he knew that his companions were awaiting him, and, ashamed to meet them and explain the cause of his inability to meet them and explain the cause of his inability to join them, he went in quest of Dick to bear his errand to them. He found him at a huckster’s shop, where he was in the habit of going in his leisure time, and making himself useful by performing small services. Richard was alone in the shop, busily arranging some fruits which were to be placed in the window as specimens. “Oh!” he exclaimed, on seeing Frank, “what a royal day you have got for your sail. “A royal day, indeed,” replied Frank, looking up wistfully to the bright, cloudless sky. “You had better make haste, Frank, for the boys will be waiting for you. Jim Allen and Harry Upham went along half an hour ago. Jim bought twelve oranges of Mr. George, and Mr. George lent Harry his flute; two merrier fellows I never saw; and they told me, if I saw you, to hurry you on.” “I am not going at all, Dick.” “Not going at all!” exclaimed Richard, struck by the words and by the sorrowful tone in which they were uttered. “Are you sick, Frank?” he asked, looking with great concern in his friend’s face. “No, not sick,” replied Frank, and half ashamed [26] that he had betrayed so much feeling on the subject, he averted his eye, and it fell on a newly-coined, glittering half dollar which was lying on the counter. “Oh if that half dollar were mine,” was his first, and, certainly, most natural thought. He turned again to the door--all the military of the town were out in honour of the day--drums were beating merrily, colours flying, and everybody, old and young, seemed to be animated with the spirit of the day. Frank looked down the street; he saw two or three of his young associates running towards the river. He again turned his eye to the tempting half dollar. Richard’s back was towards him--temptation pressed--opportunity favoured; one moment more of reflection, and he would have resisted, but he did not allow himself that moment; he grasped the half dollar, and, when Richard again turned, he was gone. Richard wondered a little at the singular manner of his friend; but he was too intent on the task of his friend; but he was too intent on the task that had been assigned him to think much of it, till, his work being finished, he looked for the money, which had been left on the counter, in payment for a brush he had sold in the absence of George Sutton, the clerk, who had gone on an errand to the next street. The poor child was trembling with the discovery of the loss when the clerk came in. “So, Dicky,” he said, “you have made a sale in my absence. I met Mrs. Lincoln’s servant with the brush. Where is the money, Dick?” he continued, unlocking the money-drawer, and standing ready to put in the half dollar. “I have not got the money, Mr. George,” Richard replied, with a trembling voice. [27] “Not got it!” exclaimed Sutton; and a suspicion darted across his mind which he could not bear to harbour for a moment. “Not got it!” he repeated. “What does this mean, Dick; where is it?” “I cannot tell,” said Richard, faltering so much that the words were scarcely articulate. George Sutton sprang over the counter; took the poor child, who now shook like an aspen leaf, by the arm, and, looking steadily in his face, which blushed crimsons, he exclaimed, “What can have tempted you to steal that money?” Richard started back --his face became pale as death--his little crooked form was drawn up to an expression of dignity, for it expressed truth and innocence. “Steal! Mr. George,” he said, and he now spoke with a firm voice; “you know I would not steal one penny for the whole world.” “I don’t think you would, Dick- I can’t think you would,” replied George, touched by the child’s appeal, and more than half convinced by his fair, direct look. “I have always found you honest, boy, and true as the sun. But where is the money? Has any one been in the shop since the man bought the brush?” Richard’s countenance again fell- again his voice faltered. “Oh do not ask me; I cannot tell you, Mr. George,” he said. “But you must tell me, Dick, or you must never come into the shop again.” “Then I never will come into it again,” replied Richard, “for I never will tell;” and, bursting into tears, he ran out of the shop, leaving the clerk utterly at a loss what construction to put on his conduct. [28] George Sutton, though not the proprietor of the shop, was the sole manager of its concerns. His master was engaged in another branch of business; and, knowing his clerk to be perfectly trustworthy, he confided the affairs of the shop entirely to him. Thus trusted, young Sutton felt the obligation to be very exact in the performance of his duties. His first determination was to expose the affair to his principal; but he had one of the kindest hearts in the world; he really loved poor little Dicky; and, believing him innocent, he could not bear to expose him to the bad opinion of a stranger; he therefore paid the half dollar out of his own pocket, and said not a word to anybody on the subject. Richard returned home with his heart full. He passed without notice all the gay parade of “Independence” -- and there was enough of it to satisfy patriots and charm boys -- and entered his mother’s humble dwelling; and there he would probably have yielded to the inquiries she would naturally have made into the cause of the disturbance--for what boy of nine years could withstand the sympathy of a tender mother--but Mrs. Shepard was in no state to observe his agitation. She had been seized that morning with pains and agues, which were, as she well knew, the prelude to violent sickness. Richard was instantly despatched for a physician, who came, but could not avert a terrible fever, which raged for four weeks, and then left this afflicted woman in a hopeless consumption. Mrs. Aikin had removed the previous spring to the country; but, before her departure, she had ta- [29] ken care to recommend Mrs. Shepard to some of her friends, who were humane and active in their charities, and Mrs. Shepard’s wants were soon known and relieved, as far as benevolence could relieve them. Mrs. Aikin was informed of her humble friend’s situation, and she wrote her a kind letter, enclosing some money, and telling her to spare herself all anxiety about her little girl, for she would take her into her own family, and provide for her so long as she should want a home. Thus relieved from solicitude concerning her youngest child, all Mrs. Shepard’s anxiety centred in Richard. He was too young to be apprenticed to a trade and there was no person whom Mrs. Shepard had the right or the courage to ask to provide for him in the mean time. Our young readers are, we trust, quite inexperienced in the sorrows of life: when they learn them, as learn them they must, may they have that spirit in which they can be borne--even the sorest of them--poverty, sickness, and death. Better than many a long sermon on resignation and trust in the goodness of God--far better would it be if we could present to the mind’s eye the humble apartment of this Christian woman, when, conscious of the fast approach of death, and that this was perhaps her last opportunity of prayer with her children, she had, in the energy of her feeling, raised her weak and wasted form from the pillows which supported her. Richard and little Mary knelt by her bedside; she held their hands in hers; her raised eye gleamed brightly, for “The immortal ray is seen more clearly through the shrine’s decay;” [30] and, making a last effort, she uttered in a low but perfectly distinct voice, “My father in heaven, to thee I commit these little ones.” She paused, and closed her eyes--once more she opened them, smiled on her children with an expression of ineffable peace, and murmured in a low whisper, “God will provide;” her face was then slightly convulsed, she let go of their hands, and sunk back on the pillow. The physician had stood unobserved in the door way; he now moved towards the bed, and exclaimed involuntarily, “She is gone!” Poor little Richard had never seen death before, but he knew what it all meant; he locked his arms around his mother’s neck, and sobbed out, “Mother--mother--mother!” till he could speak no longer; and his little sister, crying because her brother cried, repeated again and again, “Mother will speak to you when she wakes up, Dicky-- do stop crying.” But we must pass over this scene and the two sad days that followed. The little girl was removed to the house of a friend of Mrs. Aikin, and was sent to that lady by the first conveyance that offered; and, without Richard’s knowledge, arrangements had been made for his being transferred to the almshouse immediately after the funeral. There were but few persons who followed the remains of Mrs. Shepard to the grave; but if the hearts of those few had been laid open; it would have been seen that there was more honour paid to her humble, unquestionable virtue (if human esteem confers honour), than is rendered by many a sweeping procession, that attracts the eyes of multitudes with its unseemly parade. Among these [31] few followers was Frank Hardy; since the 4th of July he had never spoken with his little friend. He had some times seen him in the street; but conscience, that most uncomfortable companion to the guilty, conscience had led him to avoid Richard. Hardy had accidentally heard of Mrs. Shepard’s death, and his good feeling prevailing over every other, he went to the funeral and returned from the grave to the house, anxious to know how Richard was to be provided for. The physician and the clergyman also went home with the child; and, after consoling them as well as they are able, they told him that he was to go to the almshouse for the present. “To the almshouse!” he exclaimed. “Oh, don’t take me to the almshouse.” “But where will you go, Dicky?” asked the doctor. “I have nowhere to go,” replied the child; “I will stay here; I an’t afraid to stay alone in mother’s room.” “You cannot stay here, my poor boy; this room is not yours, you know; what objection have you to the almshouse?” “Oh, I don’t know. I hate the almshouse. Everybody hates the almshouse;” and the poor little fellow turned from his friends, laid his head on his mother’s pillow, and wept bitterly. Frank Hardy stood aside, listening with concern to every word that was uttered; he now drew near to Richard and whispered “Why don’t you go, Dicky, and speak to Mr. George Sutton? He was always a friend to you.” “He is not my friend now,” replied Richard, in [32] a voice which, though scarcely audible, reached Frank’s heart. “What makes you think so, Dick?” asked Frank, so agitated that he hardly knew what he said. Richard raised his head from the pillow, and fixed his eye on Frank. “Frank,” he said, “Mr. George thinks that it was I that stole the half dollar from him last Independence.” These few words revealed the whole state of case to Frank. He perceived that Richard had been suspected, and had voluntarily, magnanimously borne suspicion rather than betray him; his tenderest feelings had been awakened by the desolate condition of the afflicted child; and he now looked at him a sentiment of awe, for his little crooked body really seemed to him to contain a celestial spirit. “Oh, Dicky! You have been too good to me,” he exclaimed; and, unable to endure or repress his feelings, he ran out of the house. The gentlemen told Richard that they could wait no longer for him, and he prepared to accompany them; but when he looked round upon his home for the last time, it seemed as if his heart would burst. If our young friends will consider what it is they love in their homes, they will not wonder at Richard’s grief. It surely is not a great house nor fine furniture; but it is the voice of kindness, and the unwearying, unchanging love of parents; the sports and caresses of brothers and sisters, and all the endearments that make a happy home a picture of Heaven. The doctor soothed, the clergyman wiped Richard’s eyes; and at last, succeeding in quieting him, [33] they led him between them to the almshouse, and, after many kind expressions of good-will, they left him there. The poor child slunk away into the corner of the large desolate apartment into which he had been conducted; he looked around upon the sullen, discontented faces of the strange throng that filled it, each taking his or her evening meal at a solitary board; he thought of the nice little cherry table at which he had been accustomed to participate the simple meal with his mother and sister, their hearts filled with thankfulness and cheerfulness, and their faces lit up with smiles. He did not, perhaps, institute precisely the comparison we have made, but it was the change--the change--that struck upon his heart. “I can’t--I won’t stay here,” he said to himself; “I had rather starve in the street than stay here.” Some supper was offered to him, but he declined it; and a little time after he stole unobserved into the passage, groped his way into the yard, run into the street, and was out of sight long before he was missed. He knew not whither to bend his steps; scarcely knew where he was, till, looking up, he perceived that he was close to George Sutton’s shop; the recollection of the young man’s former kindness darted a ray of hope upon his darkened mind. It was perhaps more his pressing need of pity than any defined expectation of relief that made him ascend the steps; but there his heart failed him, and he sat down. He was wearied and exhausted; it was a frosty night early in November, and he was shivering with the cold. He felt utterly forsaken. He looked up to Heaven; the moon [34] was shining brightly; he thought of his mother; he remembered that he had seen her, when in the deepest distress, kneel down and pray to God, and rise up again comforted. He recollected her last words, “God will provide;” and he repeated the Lord’s prayer. He who feedeth the young ravens when they cry unto him, heard and answered the helpless child. Richard had scarcely said “Amen” when he was startled by the opening of the shop-door, and, rising on his feet, he saw Frank Hardy coming out of the shop. “Oh Dicky, is that you?” he exclaimed. “Come in, come in; I have told everything to Mr. George, and he likes you better than ever, now; and I am sure,” he added, putting his arm around Richard’s neck, “I am sure I love you better than all the world besides.” Richard was astounded; he knew not what to say, but he followed Frank into the shop. “Is that you, my good boy Dicky?” exclaimed George Sutton at the first glimpse of him; and, grasping his hand, he said,” you are an honest boy and a noble boy, Dick, and I always believed you were, in spite of appearances; but now Frank has made all clear, and, if he had known everything, he would have done you justice long before this, Dicky: reparation wipes out offences, and I’m sure you will forgive and forget all, especially when you see how Frank repents the past; bitterer tears has he shed than any that have dropped from your eyes, my poor boy.” “That I have, indeed,” said Frank; “and, till this evening, I have never had one such real happy hour since Independence as I had before; but [35] I’m sure, Dicky, I never had a thought of the trouble I had brought you into. I have read on many a tombstone ‘an honest man’s the noblest work of God;’ but, for my part, I think an honest boy and such a little boy as you, Dick, that will bear to be suspected rather than expose a friend, is something nobler still.” How long Frank would have run on thus, we know not, for happiness is very talkative; but he was interrupted by Richard. The sudden change from the outcast feeling with which he had sat on the door-step, from the solitude and the stillness of the night, to the lighted shop, friendly voices, and cheerful looks, overpowered him with a confused sense of happiness; he burst into tears; “I don’t know what it is makes me cry now,” said he, “for I feel very glad.” “You have been tried too much to-day, Dicky,” replied George Sutton. “Sit here by the fire with Frank, while I go and bring you some supper; and then you shall go to bed, in the little back room, and in the morning we will see what can be done. I am not afraid,” he continued, as he opened the shop-door, “for all that has come and gone, to leave you and Frank in the shop together.” When his kind friend returned, Richard ate his supper heartily; and when he snugged down in bed alongside of George Sutton, he thought again of his mother’s last words, and fell asleep repeating to himself “God will provide.” _____ [36] Eighteen months subsequent to the events we have related, Mrs. Aikin paid a visit to the place of her former residence. One of her first inquiries was for Richard Shepard. She was informed that she might hear of him at the store of George Sutton. She immediately went there, and found Mr. Sutton established in a well-furnished store of his own. As soon as she had introduced herself and made known her errand, Sutton called “Dicky;” and Richard came waddling into the shop as fast as his little legs could bring him, and delighted beyond expression at the sound of Mrs. Aikin’s voice. His eyes glistened, and his face brightened and smiled all over. After she had made many inquiries of him, had drawn from him a particular account of his mother’s last hours, and had told him that, with Mr. Sutton’s permission, she should take him into the country to pass a little time with his sister, she dismissed him. When he was gone she inquired of Mr. Sutton if he continued as good a child as he had been. “As good, ma’am? There can be no better; he is worth his weight in gold to me. He understands the shop business almost as well as I do myself; and he is so good-natured and obliging, and has such pleasant ways, and is, withal, such a droll-looking little chap, that he brings many a customer to the store.” Mrs. Aikin thought, as she looked in Sutton’s honest, frank, and benevolent face, that he did not stand much in need of aid to attract good-will to the shop. “I understand,” she said “ of Richard’s account of himself, that he has been with you ever since his mother’s death. I do not quite see [37] how you could provide for him all that time; for I think you did not begin for yourself till last Spring.” “I did not, ma’am; and I found it difficult to save enough out of my small wages to pay the boy’s board, though I got him boarded for a trifle. But I did make it out, without any miracle; it was only working a little harder and faring a little harder, and you know that is nothing, ma’am, after it is past.” “But how,” asked Mrs. Aikin, “could you, in such circumstances, think of assuming such an expense?” Sutton seemed for a moment greatly embarrassed by this question. He blushed deeply, and his eyes filled with tears. “I could not help it, ma’am,” he replied; “when I was five years old, my parents died, and left me, as I may say, on the street. Some kind people took me in, brought me up, and provided for me; and when this poor little motherless child came to me, I seemed to hear a voice saying, ‘Remember what was done for thee; go thou and do likewise.’” _____ This is the real instance of that efficient gratitude which makes a favour “go round,” alluded to in the beginning of our story. It is neither exaggerated nor embellished by fiction; and we hope we have not misjudged in deeming it a fact worthy of being rescued from the oblivion that is too apt to pass upon the good as upon the bad actions of men. One word more, and this humble tale is finish-- [38] ed. Frank Hardy reaped all the benefit that is to be derived from virtuous associates. The friendly counsel of Sutton induced him to fix himself in a regular employment, and his subsequent upright conduct fully expiated his single offence. He never ceased to feel and manifest affection and gratitude to Richard; and he has been heard to say, that he was sure, if Solomon had known Dicky, he would have pronounced that, instead of four, “there be five things upon the earth which are little, but they are exceeding wise.” We scarcely need add, that Richard was allowed the gratification of a visit to his sister; but our readers may have some pleasure in being told, that when the brother and sister again parted, Mrs. Aikin presented each of them a breastpin containing their mother’s hair, and on their reverses was inscribed, “God will provide.” Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource The Deformed Boy Subject The topic of the resource Charity, virtue, and honesty. Description An account of the resource A poor young boy, whose legs have been affected by rickets, attracts the attention and charity of kind friends due to his good humor and virtue. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sedgwick, Catharine Maria [by the author of "The Linwoods," "Poor Rich Man," "Love Token," "Live & Let Live," &c.] Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <em>Stories for Young Persons,</em> pp. 9-38. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available New York: Harper & Brothers Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1840 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Angie Lydon, Michael Nicosa, Cyntheara Tham, L. Damon Bach, D. Gussman Relation A related resource Originally published as <em>The Deformed Boy. </em>By the author of "Redwood," &amp;c. Brookfield: E. and G. Merriam Printers, 1826. <br />Reprinted as <em>The Deformed Boy.</em> By the author of "Redwood." Springfield: Merriam, Little &amp; Co, 1831.<br />Collected in Stories for Young Persons, 1840, 9-38, reprinted 1841, 1842, 1846, 1855, 1860; reprinted 184? By the author of "The Linwoods," "Poor Rich Man," "Love Token," "Live and Let Live," &amp;c. London: W. Smith. Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Document 1840 4th of July abandonment Aeolus Aladdin's lamp almshouse Apollo benevolence Benjamin Franklin boyhood charity Christianity Consumption Cotton Mather deathbed deformity fairy Fortunatus' cap funeral gender roles girls-work God gratitude H. Gally Knight Honesty Independence Day intemperance juvenile literature knitting laudanum literacy Magnalia Christi Americana marriage Midas Mothers orphans Ovid philosopher's stone poverty prayer Proverbs 30:24 Psalm 103 public assistance public education rickets self reliance sewing shame shopkeeper sons star-spangled banner Stories for Young Persons tears virtue widows https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/4347/archive/files/b72eec741252b21c161f0b0094837cb0.pdf?Expires=1781740800&Signature=lLPzTwSWUbk-Oxe3aDu27Exocr7U2BXHlMRqSXb4zJ8gN5yRdJ2uFX7XbguVZAxu7SpX%7EFEh4aBrvHX6fkyMbaxEkm3AiAlMDA23X2ILV15xJV7MH8ItPCF0lxczW%7EXUavox-YkyaRFZTRBzzNZT2WBOIsUjWu0CIVovZhm00-XaYnyXUVnB%7EWBaIUlLTaQ2bgx6VW6zvcIeBuCFnD%7EOISsU25smy5SVUUhIjP8qEO48zKEqfumVl%7EKuw5HuHiR6okaMJeao0G2m3yJPsh2zyEhL78cfWlZ495QQ7LpWHclX7yb2n%7ESo4Fjc59wABM1IsKhzfZ25S9Cj0mQ1wTJplg__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 5f1b1d8b1ddde5de35e83b921acc61bd Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1826 Document A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text. Text Any textual data included in the document. MODERN CHIVALRY. _____ BY THE AUTHOR OF REDWOOD. _____ “But when the hour of trouble comes to the mind or the body---and when the hour of death comes, that comes to high and low---Oh, my leddy, then it is’na what we hae dune for oursells, but what we hae dune for others, that we think on maist pleasantly.”---Heart of Midlothian. _____ THE assertion that a tale is founded on fact, is a pious fraud of story tellers, too stale to impose on any but the very young, or very credulous. We hope therefore, not to be suspected of resorting to an expedient that would expose our poverty without relieving it, when we declare that the leading incidents of the following tale are true—that they form, in that district of country where some of the circumstances transpired, a favourite and well authenticated tradition—and that our hero boasts with well-earned self-complacency, that there is no name better known than his from ‘Cape May to the Head of Elk.’ That name, however honourable as it is, must be suppressed, and we here honestly beg the possessor’s pardon for compelling him, for the first time in his life, to figure under false colours. [6] In the year 1768, an American vessel lying in the Thames and bound to Oxford, a small sea-port on the eastern shore of Maryland, was hailed by a boat containing a youth, who, on presenting himself to the captain, stated that he had a fancy for a sailor’s life, and offered his services for two years, on the simple condition of kind treatment. The captain, though himself a coarse illiterate man, perceived in the air and language of the lad indications of good breeding, and deeming him some disobedient child, or possibly a runaway apprentice, declined receiving him. But William Herion, as he called himself, was so earnest in his solicitations, and engaging in his manners, and the captain, withal, in pressing need of a cabin-boy, that he waved his scruples, quieted his conscience with the old opiate that it was best not to be more nice than wise, and without inquiring too curiously into the boy’s right of self-disposal, drew up some indentures, by which he entitled himself to two years’ service. The boy was observed for the first day to wear a troubled countenance. His eye glanced around with incessant restlessness, as if in eager search of some expected object. While the ship glided down the Thames, he gazed on the shore as if he looked for some signal on which his life depended, and when she passed Gravesend, the last point of embarkation, he wept convulsively. The captain believed him to be dis- [7] turbed with remorse of conscience; the sailors, that these heart-breakings were lingerings for his native land, and all hinted their rude consolations. Soothed by their friendly efforts, or by his own reflections, or perhaps following the current of youth that naturally flows to happiness, William soon became tranquil, and sometimes even gay. He kept, as the sailors said, on the fair weather side of the captain, a testy, self-willed old man, who loved but three things in the world—his song, his glass, and his own way. All that had been fabled of the power of music over stones and brutes, was surpassed by the effect of the lad’s melting voice on the icy heart of the captain, whom frty years of absolute power had rendered as despotic as a Turkish Pacha. When their old commander blew his stiffest gale, as the sailors were wont to term his blustering passions, Will could, they said, sing him into a calm. Will of course became a doting piece to the whole ship’s company. They said he was a trim built lad, too neat and delicate a piece of workmanship for the stormy sea. They laughed at his slender fingers, fitter to manage threads than ropes, passed many jokes upon his soft blue eyes and fair round cheeks, and in their rough language expressed Sir Toby’s prayer, that “Jupiter in his next commodity of hair, would send the boy a beard.” In the main Will bore their jokes without flinching, and returned them with even measure; but sometimes when they verged to rudeness, his rising blush or a tear [8] stealing from his downcast eye, expressed an instinctive and unsullied modesty, whose appeal touched the best feelings of these coarse men. The ship made a prosperous voyage, and in due time arrived off the American coast. It is a common custom with sailors to greet the first sight of land with a sacrifice to Bacchus. The natural and legalized revel was as extravagant on this, as it usually is on similar occasions. The captain with unwonted good humour, dealt out the liquor most liberally to the crew, and bade William sing them his best songs. Will obeyed, and song after song, and glass after glass carried them, as they said, far above high water mark. Their language and manners became intolerable to William, and he endeavoured to steal away with the intention of hiding himself in the cabin, till the revel was over. One of the sailors suspecting his design, caught him rudely and swore he would detain him in his arms. William struggled, freed himself, and darted down the companion way, the men following and shouting. The captain stood at the entrance of the cabin door. William sunk down at his feet terrified and exhausted, and screaming “protect me—oh! For the love of heaven, protect me.” The captain demanded the occasion of the uproar, and ordered the men to stand back. They, however, stimulated to reckless courage, and in sight of the land and independence, no longer feared his authority, and [9] they swore that they would not be balked of their frolic. Poor Will, already feeling their hands upon him, clung in terror to the captain, and one fear overcoming another, confessed that his masculine dress was a disguise, and wringing his hands with shame and anguish, supplicated protection as a helpless girl. The sailors touched with remorse and pity, retreated; but the brutal captain spurned the trembling supplicant with his foot, swearing a round oath that it was the first time he had been imposed on, and it should be the last. Unfortunately the old man, priding himself on his sagacity, was as confident of his own infallibility as the most devoted Catholic is of the Pope’s. This was his last voyage, and after playing Sir Oracle, for forty years—to have been palpably deceived—incontrovertibly outwitted by a girl of fifteen, was a mortification that his vanity could not brook. He swore he would have his revenge, and most strictly did he perform his vow. He possessed a plantation in the vicinity of Oxford; thither he conveyed the unhappy girl, and degraded her to the rank of a common servant, among the negro slaves in his kitchen. The captain’s wrath was magnified, by the stranger’s persisting in refusing to disclose the motive of her deception, to reveal her family, or even to tell her name. Her new acquaintance were at a loss what to call her, till the captain’s daughter, who had been [10] on a visit to Philadelphia, and seen the Winter’s Tale performed there, bestowed on her the pretty appellative of Hermione’s lost child, Perdita. The captain, a common case, was the severest sufferer by his own passions. His wife complained that his “venture,” as she provokingly styled poor Perdita, was a useless burden on her household—“a fine lady born and bred, like feathers, and flowers, and French goods, pretty to look at, but fit for no use in the world.” The captain’s daughters partly instigated by compassion, and partly by the striking contrast between the delicate graces of the stranger and their own buxom beauty, incessantly teased their father to send her back to her own country; and neighbours and acquaintances were forever letting fall some observation on the beauty of the girl, or some allusion to her story, that was a spark of fire to the captain’s gunpowder temper. Weeks and months rolled heavily on without a dawn of hope to poor Perdita. She was too young and inexperienced herself, to contrive any mode of relief, and no one was likely to undertake voluntarily the difficult enterprise of rescuing her from her thraldom. Her condition was thus forlorn, when her story came to the ears of Frank Stuart, a gallant young sailor on board the Hazard, a vessel lying in the stream off Oxford, and on the eve of sailing for Cowes in the Isle of Wight. Frank stood deservedly high in the confidence of his commander, and on [11] Sunday, the day preceding that appointed for the departure of the ship, he obtained leave to go on shore. His youthful imagination was excited by the story of the oppressed stranger, and he strolled along the beach in the direction of her master’s plantation, in the hope of gratifying his curiosity by a glimpse of her. As he approached the house, he perceived that the front blinds were closed, and inferring thence that the family were absent, he ventured within the bounds of the plantation, and saw at no great distance from him a young female sitting on a bench beneath a tree. She leaned her head against its trunk, with an air of dejectedness and abstraction, that encouraged the young man to hope he had already attained his object. As he approached nearer, the girl started from her musings and would have retreated to the house, but suddenly inspired by her beauty and youth with a resolution to devote himself to her service, he besought her to stop for one instant and listen to him. She turned and gazed at him as if she would have perused his heart. Frankness and truth were written on his face by the finger of heaven. She could not fear any impertinence from him, and farther assured by his respectful manner, when he added, “I have something particular to say to you—but we must luff and bear away, for we are in too plain sight of the look out there,” and he pointed to the house—she smiled and followed him to a more secluded part of the grounds. As soon as he was sure [12] of being beyond observation, “Do you wish,” he asked with professional directness, “to return to old England?” She could not speak, but she clasped her hands, and the tears gushed like an open fountain from her eyes—“you need not say any more—you need not say any more,” he exclaimed, for he felt every tear to be a word spoken to his heart—“If you will trust me,” he continued, “I swear, and so God help me as I speak the truth, I will treat you as if you were my sister. Our ship sails to-morrow morning at day light, make a tight bundle of your rigging, and meet me at twelve o’clock to-night at the gate of the plantation. Will you trust me?” “Heaven has sent you to me,” replied the poor girl, her face brightening with hope, “and I will not fear to trust you.” They then separated—Perdita to make her few preparations, and Frank to contrive the means of executing his romantic enterprise. Precisely at the appointed hour the parties met at the place of rendezvous. Perdita was better furnished for her voyage than could have been anticipated, from the durance she had suffered. A short notice and a scant wardrobe, were never known to oppose an obstacle to a heroine’s compassing sea and land; but as we have dispensed with the facilities of fiction, we are bound to account for Perdita’s being in possession of the necessaries of life, and it is due to the [13] captain’s daughter to state, that her feminine sympathy had moved her from time to time to grant generous supplies to Perdita, which our heroine did not fail to acknowledge on going away, by a letter enclosing a valuable ring. A few whispered sentences of caution, assurance and gratitude, were reciprocated by Frank and Perdita, as they bent their hasty steps to the landing-place where he had left his boat; and when he had handed her into it, and pushed from the shore on to his own element, he felt the value of the trust which this beautiful young creature had reposed to him. Never in the days of knightly deeds was there a sentiment of purer chivalry, than that which inspired the determined resolution and romantic devotion of the young sailor. He was scarcely twenty, the age of fearless project, and self-confidence. How soon is the one checked by disappointments—the other humbled by experience of the infirmity of human virtue! Stuart had not confided his designs to any of his shipmates. He was therefore obliged warily to approach the ship, and to get on board with the least possible noise. He had just time to secrete Perdita amidst bales of tobacco, in the darkest place in the hold of the vessel, when a call of “all hands on deck,” summoned him to duty. He was foremost at his post, and all was stir and bustle to get the vessel under way. The sails were hoisted—the anchor [14] weighed, and all in readiness, when a signal was heard from the shore, and presently a boat filled with men seen approaching. The men probed to be Perdita’s master, a sheriff, and his attendants. They produced a warrant empowering them to search the vessel. The old captain affirmed that the girl had been seen on the preceding day, talking with a young spark, who was known to have come on shore from the Hazard. In his fury he foamed at the mouth, swore he would have the runaway dead or alive, and that her aider and abettor should be given over to condign punishment. The master of the Hazard declared, that if any of his men were found guilty, he would resign them to the dealings of land law, and to prove if there was a plot, he was quite innocent, but he not only freely abandoned his vessel to the search, but himself was most diligent in the inquest. The men were called up, confronted and examined; not one appeared more cool and unconcerned than Frank Stuart, and after every inquiry, after ransacking as they believed, in every possible place of concealment, the pursuers were compelled to withdraw, baffled and disappointed. The vessel proceeded on her voyage.—Frank requested the captain’s permission to swing a hammock alongside his birth, on the pretence that the birth was rendered damp and unwholesome by a leak in the deck above it. The reasonable petition was of course granted, and when night had closed watch- [15] ful eyes, and dropped her friendly veil, so essential to the clandestine enterprises of the most ingenious, Frank rescued Perdita from a position, in which she had suffered not only the inconveniences, but the terrors of an African slave; and wrapping her in his own dreadnought, and drawing his watchcap over her bright luxuriant hair, he conducted her past the open door of the captain’s state-room, and past his sleeping companions, to his own birth; then whispering to her, “that she was safe as a ship in harbour,” he gave her some bread and a glass of wine, for which he had bartered his allowance of spirits, and laid himself down in his own hammock, to the companionship of such thoughts as are ministering angels about the pillow of the virtuous. The following day a storm arose—a storm still remembered, as the most terrible and disastrous that ever occurred in Chesapeake Bay. There were several passengers of consequence on board the Hazard, among others two deacons who were going to the mother country to receive orders—for then, we of the colonies, who have since taken all rights into our own hands, dared not exercise the rights God had given us, without the assent of the Lords Bishops. Night came on, the storm increased, and then, when the ship was in extremity, when death howled in every blast, when “the timid shrieked and the brave stood still”—then was the unwearied activity, the exhaustless invention, and the unconquerable re- [16] solution of Frank Stuart, the last human support and help of the unhappy crew. The master of the Hazard was advanced in life, and unnerved by the usual feebleness and timidity of age. He had but just enough presence of mind left, to estimate the masterly conduct of young Stuart, and he abandoned the command of the vessel to him, and retired to what is too often only a last resource—to prayers with the churchmen. Once or twice Stuart disappeared from the deck, ran to whisper a word of encouragement to his trembling charge, and then returned with renewed vigour to his duty. Owing, under Providence, to his exertions, the Hazard rode out a storm which filled the seaman’s annals with many a tale of terror. Gratitude is too apt to rest in second causes, in the visible means of deliverance, and perhaps an undue portion was now felt towards the intrepid youth. The passengers lavished their favours on him—they supplied his meals with the most delicate wines and fruits, and the choicest viands from their own stores; he, with the superstition characteristic of his profession, firmly believed that heaven had sent the storm to unlock their hearts to him, and thus afford him the means of furnishing Perdita with dainties suited to her delicate appetite, so that she fared, as he afterwards boasted, like the daughter of a king in her father’s palace. Stuart was kept in a state of perpetual alarm by the mate of the vessel. He knew that this fellow, one [17] of those imbeciles that bend like a reed before a strong blast, had been hostile to him ever since the storm, when the accidental superiority of his station had been compelled to bow to Frank’s superior genius. He was aware that the mate had, by malicious insinuations, estranged the captain from him, and he was but too certain that he should have nothing to hope, if his secret were discovered by this base man. Perhaps this apprehension gave him an air of unwonted constraint in the presence of his enemy; certain it is, the mate’s eye often rested on him with an expression of eager watchfulness and suspicion, and Stuart, perceiving it, would contract his brow and compress his lips, in a way that betrayed how hard he strove with his rising passion. The difficulty of concealment was daily increasing, as one after another of his messmates, either from some inevitable accident, or from a communication becoming necessary on his part, obtained possession of his secret. But his ascendency over them was complete, and by threats or persuasions, he induced them all to promise inviolable secrecy. There is an authority in a determined spirit, to which men naturally do homage. It is heaven’s own charter of a power, to which none can refuse submission. Frank never permitted his comrades to approach Perdita, or to speak a word to her; but in the depths of the night, when the mate’s and the old captain’s senses were locked in sleep, he would bring her forth [18] to breathe the fresh air. Seated on the gunwale, she would bestow on him the only reward in her gift—the treasures of her sweet voice; and Frank said the winds sat still in the sails to listen. There were times when not a human sound was heard in the ship, when these two beings, borne gently on by the tides in mid ocean, felt as if they were alone in the universe. It was at such times that Frank felt an irrepressible curiosity to know something more of the mysterious history of Perdita, whose destiny heaven, he believed, had committed to his honour; and once he ventured to introduce the topic nearest his heart, by saying, “you bade me call you Perdita, but I do not like the name; it puts me too much in mind of those rodomontade novels, that turn the girls’ heads and set them asailing, as it were, without chart or compass, in quest of unknown worlds”—He hesitated; it was evident he had betaken himself to a figure, to avoid an explicit declaration of his wishes—after a moment’s pause he added—“it suits me best to be plain-spoken—it is not the name that I object to so much, but—but, hang it—I think you know Frank Stuart now, well enough to trust him with your real name.” The unhappy girl cast down her eyes, and said “that Perdita suited her better than any other name.” “Then you will not trust me?” “Say not so, my noble, generous friend,” she ex- [19] claimed—“trust you!—have I not trusted you!—you know that I would trust you with any thing that was my own—but my name—my father’s name, I have forfeited by my folly.” “Oh no—that you shall not say—a brave ship is not run down with a light breeze, and a single folly of a young girl cannot sink a good name—a folly!” he continued, thus indirectly pushing inquiries, “if it is a folly, it’s a common one—there’s many a stouter heart than your’s, that’s tried to face a gale of love, and been obliged to bear about and scud before the wind.” “Who told you?—how did you discover?” demanded Perdita in a hurried, alarmed manner. Frank’s generous temper disdained to surprise the unwary girl into confidence, and he immediately surrendered the advantage he had gained. “Nobody has told me,” he said—“I have discovered nothing—I only guessed, as the yankees say—now wipe away your tears—the sea wants no more salt water, and believe me Frank Stuart has not such a woman’s spirit in him, that he cannot rest content without knowing a secret.” In spite of Frank’s manly resolution, he did afterwards repeatedly intimate the longings of his curiosity, but they were always met with such unaffected distress on the part of Perdita, that he said he had not the heart to press them. As the termination of the voyage approached, [20] Stuart became more intensely anxious lest his secret should be discovered. Stuart became more intensely anxious lest his secret should be discovered. The mildest consequence would be, that he should forfeit his wages. That he cared not for¬—like Goldsmith’s poor soldier, he could lie on a bare board, and thank God he was so well off. “While he had youth and health,” he said, “and there was a ship afloat on the wide sea, he was provided for.” But his companions who had been true to him might forfeit their pay; for, by their fidelity to him, they had in some measure become his accessaries. But he found consolation even under this apprehension; “the honest lads,” he said, “would soon make a full purse empty, but the memory of a good action was a treasure gold could not buy—a treasure that would stick by them forever—a treasure for the port of heaven.” There was, however, one apprehended evil, for which his philosophy offered no antidote. He was sure the captain would deem it his duty, or make it his will, (even Frank’s slight knowledge of human nature told him that will and duty were too often convertible terms,) to return the fugitive to her soi-disant master in Maryland. Nothing could exceed the vigilance with which he watched every movement and turn that threatened a detection, or the ingenuity with which he evaded every circumstance that tended to it—but alas! the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. One night when it was blowing a gale, a particular [21] rope was wanted, which the mate remembered to have stowed away in the steerage. Frank eagerly offered to search for it, but the mate was certain that no one but himself could find it, and taking a lantern he went in quest of it. Frank followed him with fear and trembling. He has since been in many a desperate sea-fight, but he declares he never felt so much like a coward as at that moment. The mate’s irritable humour had been somewhat stirred by Frank’s persisting in his offer, to go for the rope, and when he turned and saw him at his heels, he asked him angrily, “what he was dogging him for?” “The ship rolls so heavily,” replied Frank in a subdued tone, “that I thought you might want me to hold the lantern for you.” Frank’s unwonted meekness quite conciliated the mate, and though he rejoined, “I think I have been used to the rolling of a ship a little longer than you, young man,” he spoke good-naturedly, and Frank ventured to proceed. Most fortunately, as Frank thought, the mate directed his steps to the side of the ship opposite Perdita, but making a little circuit in his return, he passed between Frank’s hammock and Perdita’s birth. At this moment the poor lad’s heart, as he afterwards averred, stopped beating. The ship rolled on that side, and the mate catching hold of the birth to save himself from falling, exclaimed, “In heaven’s name what lazy devil is here, when every hand is wanted on deck;” and raising his lantern to identify [22] the supposed delinquent sailor, he discovered the beautiful girl. For a moment he was dumb with amazement, but soon recalling the search at Oxford, the whole truth flashed upon him: he turned to Frank, and shaking his fist in his face, “Ah, this is you, Stuart!” he said, and enforced his gesture with a horrible oath. “Yes,” retorted Frank, now standing boldly forth, “it is me, thank God”—and then drawing a curtain that he had arranged before Perdita’s birth, he bade her fear nothing. “Oh Frank,” she exclaimed, “I cannot fear where you are.” This involuntary expression of confidence went to her protector’s heart. There is no man so dead to sentiment, as not to be touched by the trust of woman, especially if she be young and beautiful. Frank was at the age when sentiment is absolute, and he was resolved to secure his treasure at every hazard. Perdita’s declaration, while it stimulated his zeal, awakened the mean jealousies of the mate. “And so my pretty miss,” he said, “you fear nothing where this fellow is—I can tell you, for all that he may boast, and you may believe, he is neither master nor mate yet, and please the Lord I’ll prove as much to him this very night.” “And how will you prove it?” asked Stuart, in a voice which, though as calm as he could make it, resembled the low growl of a bull dog before he springs on his victim. [23] “I’ll prove it, my lad, by telling the whole story of your smuggled goods to the captain. A pretty piece of work this, to be carried on under the nose of your officers. It’s no better than a mutiny, for I’ll warrant it the whole ship’s crew are leagued with you.” Stuart reined in his passions, and condescended to expostulate. He represented to the mate that he could gain nothing by giving information to the captain. He described with his simple eloquence, the oppression the poor girl had already suffered; the cruelty of disappointing her present hopes, just as they were on the point of being realized, for the ship was not more than twenty-four hours sail from Cowes; he appealed to his compassion, his generosity, his manliness, but in vain, he found no accessible point. The mean pride of having discovered the secret, and the pleasure of humbling Stuart, mastered every good feeling of the mate, if indeed he possessed any, and he turned away, saying with a sort of chuckling exultation, “that he should go and do his duty.” “Stop,” cried Frank, grasping his arm with a gripe that threatened to crush it. “Stop and hear me—I swear by him that made me, if you dare so much as to hint by word, look or movement, the secret you have discovered here, you shall not cumber the earth another day—day—said I—no, not an hour—I’ll send you to the devil as swift as a canon ball ever went to the mark—Look,” he continued, tearing away the [24] curtain he had just drawn before Perdita—“could any thing short of the malice of Satan himself contrive to harm such helpless innocence as that—do you hear me”—he added in a voice that outroared the storm—“in God’s name look at me, and see I am in earnest.” The mate had no doubt to satisfy, he trembled like an aspen leaf—in vain he essayed to raise his eyes, the passion that glanced in Frank’s face, and dilated his whole figure, affected the trembling wretch like a stroke of the sun. He reeled in Frank’s iron grasp, his abject fear changed Stuart’s wrath to contempt, and giving him an impulse that sent him quite out of the door, he returned to sooth Perdita with the assurance that they had nothing to fear from the “cowardly dog.” She was confounded with terror, but much more frightened by the vehemence of Stuart’s passion than by the threats of the mate. She had always seen her protector move like an unobstructed stream along its course, in calm and silent power. Now he was the torrent, that no human force could control or direct. She saw before her calamities far worse than any she had endured. She believed that the mate, as soon as he was recovered from his paroxysm of terror, would communicate his discovery. She apprehended the most fatal issue from Frank’s threats and determined resolution, and the possibility that his generous zeal for her might involve him in crime, was intolerable to her. Such thoughts do not become less [25] terrible by solitary meditation—in the solemnity of night and amidst the howlings of a storm. Every blast spoke reproach and warning to Perdita, and tortured by those harpies remorse and fear, she took a sudden resolution to reveal herself to the captain, feeling at the moment that if she warded off evil from her protector, she could patiently abide the worst consequences to herself. She sprang from her birth as if afraid of being checked by a second thought, and rushed from the steerage to the cabin. All was perfect stillness there—the passengers had retired to their beds. The captain was sitting by the table, he had been reading, but his book had fallen to the floor, his head had sunk on his breast, and he was in a profound sleep. The light shone full on his weather-beaten face—on large uncouth features—on lines deepened to furrows—and muscles stiffened by time. Never was there an aspect more discouraging to one who needed mercy, and poor Perdita stood trembling before him and close to him, and dared not, could not speak. She heard a footstep approaching, still her tongue was glued to the roof of her mouth. Then she heard her name pronounced in a low whisper at the cabin door, and turning, she saw Stuart there beckoning most earnestly to her. She shook her head, signed to him to withdraw, and laid her hand on the captain’s shoulder. There was but one way to thwart her intentions, and Frank’s was not a hesi- [26] tating spirit, he sprang forward, caught her in his arms, and before the old man had rubbed his eyes fairly open, Perdita was again safe in the steerage. Stuart’s threats produced the intended effect on the mate; he was completely intimidated. He scarcely ventured out of Frank’s sight lest he should incur his dangerous suspicions, and the next day the vessel, accelerated by the gale of the preceding evening, arrived at Cowes. The captain and mate immediately landed, and Stuart no longer embarrassed by their presence, was able to take the necessary measures for Perdita. She assured him that if once conveyed to the main land, to Portsmouth or Southampton, she could herself take the coach for London, and there, she said, happiness or misery awaited her, which her noble protector could neither promote or avert. A wherry was procured. Before Perdita was transferred to it, she took leave of all the sailors, shook hands with each of them, and expressed to them individually, her gratitude and good wishes. Her words conveyed nothing but a sense of obligation, but there was something of condescension in her manner, and much of the grace of high station that contrasted strikingly with the abased, fearful, and shrinking air of the girl who had, till then, only been seen gliding like a spectre along the deck, attended by Stuart, and veiled by the shadows of night. As the wherry parted from the ship, she bowed her head [27] and waved her handkerchief to Frank’s shipmates, and they returned her salutation with three loud cheers. Stuart attended her to an inn at Portsmouth, engaged for her a seat in the London coach, and then followed her to a private apartment which he had secured, to bid her farewell. Perdita, from the moment she had felt her emancipation from a degrading condition, and the joy of setting her foot again on her native land, had manifested perhaps, an undue elation of sprits, an elation so opposite to Frank’s feelings, that to him it was a grating discord; but when she saw him for the last time, every other emotion gave place to unfeigned sorrow and inexpressive gratitude. Stuart laid a purse on the table beside her. “My shipmates” he said, “receive their wages to-morrow, so they have been right glad to make their pockets clear of the little trash that was in them, which may be of service to you, though it is of no use to them.” “Oh Frank!” she exclaimed, “if I should ever have any thing in my gift—if I could but reward you for all you have done for me!” All the blood in Frank’s heart rushed to his face, and he said in a voice almost inarticulate with offended pride, “there are services that money cannot buy, and thank God, there are feelings in a poor man’s breast worth more than all the gold in the king’s coffers.” “Oh what have I said,” exclaimed Perdita, “I [28] would rather die—rather return to the depth of misery from which you rescued me—yes, ten times told, than to speak one word that should offend you—you to whom I owe every thing—my life—and more than life. I did not say—I did not think, that money could reward you.” “Do not speak that word again,” said Frank, half ashamed of his pride, and half glorying in it. “Reward! I want none but your safety and the blessed memory of having done my duty. Money—ho! I care no more for it, than for the dust I tread upon.” “I know it—I am sure of it,” cried Perdita, humbled for the moment by a sense of an elevation of soul in Frank, that exalted him far above any accidents of birth or education. “Frank, you are rich in every thing that is good and noble—and what am I, to talk of reward—poor—poor in every thing but gratitude to you, Frank—I am not poor in that—you must not then despise me, and you will not forget me—and you will keep this ring for my sake.” Frank took the ring, and the lily hand she extended to him—his tears fell fast upon it—he struggled for a moment with his feelings, then dashed away his tears, and half-articulating “God bless you!” he hurried out the apartment. Thus separating himself from the beautiful young creature, for whom he had performed a most difficult service with religious fidelity; and of whose name even, he was forever to remain in ignorance. [29] The enterprising talent of Stuart ensured its appropriate reward. In one year from the memorable voyage above related, he commanded a vessel; and on the breaking out of the revolutionary war, he devoted himself to his country’s cause, with the fervent zeal with characterized and consecrated that cause—which made the common interest a matter of feeling—a family affair to each individual. Stuart commanded an armed merchantman, and disputes with the noted Paul Jones the honour of having first struck down the British flag. However this may be, he was distinguished for his skill and intrepidity—and, above all, (and this distinction endures when the most brilliant achievements have become insignificant,) for his humanity to those whom the fortune of war cast in his power. While on a cruise off the West Indies, Stuart intercepted an enemy’s ship bound to Antigua. His adversary was far superior to him in men and guns, but as it did not comport with Stuart’s bold spirit to make any very nice calculations of an enemy’s superiority, he prepared without hesitation for action. The contest was a very severe one, and the victory long doubtful; but at last the British captain struck his colours. Though we certainly are disposed to render all honour to the skill of our hero, yet we dare not claim for him the whole merit of his success, but rather solve the mystery of victory at such odds, by quoting the expression of a patriotic English boy, [30] who said on a similar occasion—“Ah, but the Americans would not have beaten, if the Lord had not been on their side.” After the fight the English commander requested an interview with captain Stuart; he informed him that the wife and mother of the governor of Antigua were on board his vessel, and that they were almost distracted with terror; he entreated therefore that they might be received with the humanity which their sex demanded, and the deference always due to high station. Stuart replied, “that as to high station, he held that all God’s creatures, who feared their Creator and did their duty, were on a dead level—and as to the duties of humanity, he trusted no American captain need go further than his own heart, for instructions how to perform them.” The British captain was ignorant of the spirit of the times, and auguring nothing favourable from Stuart’s republican reply, returned with a heavy heart to the ladies to conduct them on board the captor’s ship. The elder lady the mother, was a woman of rank, with all the pride and prejudice of high birth. The Americans she deemed all of that then much despised order—the common people; rebels and robbers were the best names she bestowed on them, and in the honesty of her ignorance she sincerely believed that she had fallen into the hands of pirates. The younger lady, though deeply affected by their disastrous situation, endeavoured to calm her mother’s apprehensions, and assured her that [31] she had heard there were men of distinguished humanity among the American sailors. The old lady shook her head incredulously. “Oh heaven help us,” she groaned, “what can we expect from such horrid fellows, when they know they have lady Strangford and the right honourable Mrs. Liston in their power—and your beauty, Selina! your beauty child! it is a fatal treasure to fall among thieves with—depend on’t— arrange your veil so that it will hang in thick folds over your face—I will draw my hood close.” The precaution on her part seemed quite superfluous, but the young lady obscured some of heaven’s cunningest workmanship with her impervious veil. The servants were ordered to deliver the ladies baggage to the American captain, with a request that some necessaries might be reserved. Stuart answered that he interfered with no private property, and that all the baggage of the ladies remained at their disposal. Lady Strangford was somewhat reassured by this generosity, and attended by her captain and followed by her daughter and servants, she proceeded to Stuart’s ship. Stuart advanced to meet them and offered her his hand—she proudly declined it and passed silently on. A gust of wind blew back her hood—“Faith!” exclaimed one of the sailor who observed the scrupulosity with which she replaced it, “the old lady had best show her face, for I’m sure we’ll all give a good birth to such an iron-bound coast as that.” But as the same breeze blew aside the young lady’s [32] veil, there was a general murmur of admiration. She had at the moment graciously accepted the tender of Stuart’s hand, in the hope of counteracting the impression of her mother’s rudeness, and when her veil was removed he had a full view of her face; conscious that many were gazing on her, she blushed deeply, and hastily readjusted it without raising her eyes. Stuart dropped her hand—smothered an exclamation, and retreated a few paces, leaving her to follow her mother alone. One of his officers observing his emotion, said, “How is this captain? you don’t wink at a broadside, and yet you start at one flash from a lady’s bright face.” “I got a scratch on my right arm in the engagement,” returned Stuart, evading the raillery, “and the lady’s touch gave me a pang.” He then retired to his state-room, and wrote the following note, which he directed to be delivered to the young lady. “Captain Stuart’s compliments to the ladies under his protection—he incloses a ring once bestowed upon him in acknowledgment of honourable conduct, as a pledge to them that the hand that has worn such a badge shall never be sullied by a bad deed. Captain Stuart will proceed immediately to Antigua, conveying the ladies with the least possible delay to their destined port.” Such a communication to prisoners of war, might naturally excite emotion in a generous bosom, but it did not account for the ex- [33] cess of it manifested by the young lady. She became pale and faint, and when her mother, alarmed at such a demonstration of feeling, took up the note, she caught it from her, and then, after a second thought, relinquished it to her. “I see nothing in this Selina,” said the old lady, after perusing and reperusing it, “to throw you into such a flurry, but you are young, and are thinking no doubt of getting home to your husband and children, young people’s feelings, are, like soft wax, easily melted.” “There is a warmth in some kindness,” rejoined the daughter earnestly, “that ought to melt the hardest substance.” “Really, I do not see any thing so very striking in this man’s civility. It would be, of course you know in the British navy; politeness, and all that sort of thing being inborn in an Englishman, but it may be, indeed I fancy it is, quite unheard of in an American.” “Shall I write our acknowledgments, madam, to captain Stuart?” asked the young lady with evident solicitude to drop the conversation. “Certainly—certainly, my dear Selina, always be ceremoniously polite with your inferiors.” “Madam, I think this noble captain,” she would have added, “has no superiors,” but afraid of further discussion, she concluded her sentence with the tame addition, “richly deserves our thanks.” She then wrote the following note. “Mrs. Liston, [34] in behalf of her mother in law lady Strangford, and on her own part, offers her warmest thanks to captain Stuart—the ladies esteem it heaven’s peculiar mercy that captain Stuart is their captor. They have already had such experience of his magnanimity, as to render them perfectly tranquil in reposing their safety and happiness on his honour.” The ring, without any allusion to it, was reinclosed. When captain Stuart had perused the note, he inquired if the lady had not requested to speak with him. He was answered that so far from intimating such a wish, she had said to her mother that she should remain in her state-room, till she was summoned to leave captain Stuart’s vessel. The captain looked extremely chagrined, he knit his brows, and bit his lips, and gave his orders hastily, with the usual sea expletives appended to them—“a sure sign,” his men said, “that something went wrong with their captain,” but these signs of repressed emotion were all the expression he allowed to his offended pride, or perhaps his better feelings. The Ladies were scrupulously served, and every deferential attention paid to them that lady Strangford would have anticipated in the best disciplined ship in his majesty’s service. A few days’ sail brought the schooner to the port of Antigua. She entered the harbour under a flag of truce, and remained there just time enough for the disembarkation of the ladies and their suite. During this ceremony the captain remained in his birth, under [35] pretext of a violent head-ache; but it was observed that they were no sooner fairly off than he was on the deck again, moving about with an activity and even impetuosity that seemed quite incompatible with a debilitating malady. Captain Stuart continued for some months a fortunate cruise about the West India islands. His was not the prudent maxim that “discretion is the better part of valour,” but when valour would have been bootless he knew how to employ the alternative, and his little schooner was celebrated as the most desperate fighter and the swiftest sailor in those seas, and her captain became so formidable, that the English admiral off that station gave orders that the schooner should be followed and destroyed at all hazards. Soon after this he was pursued by a ship of the line and compelled to take refuge in the harbour of St. Kitts, a French, and of course a friendly port to the American flag. Here he anchored his vessel, and deeming himself perfectly secure, and wearied with hard duty, he retired to his birth after setting a watch, and dismissing his crew to repose. In the middle of the night he was alarmed by an attack from the pursuing frigate, which had contrived to elude the vigilance of the fort that guarded the entrance of the harbour, and was already in such a position in relation to him as to cut off every possibility of escape. His spirit, far from quailing, was exasperated by the surprise. He fought as the most courageous animals [36] fight at bay. To increase the horror of his situation, the commander of the fort, from some fatal mistake, opened a fire upon him. He was boarded on all sides by boats manned with eighty-four men. We are too ignorant of such matters, and too peaceably inclined to give any interest to the particulars of a sea-fight. Suffice it to say, that our hero did not surrender till he was himself disabled by wounds, his little band cut down, and his schooner a wreck. When the British commander ascertained the actual force with which he had contended, his pride was stung with the consciousness that a victory so dearly bought, had all of defeat but the disgraceful name; and, incapable of that sympathy which a magnanimous spirit always feels with a noble captive, he arraigned captain Stuart before him as a criminal, and demanded of him how he dared against the law of nations, to defend an indefensible vessel. “Did you think,” retorted Stuart with cold contempt, “that I had gunpowder and would not burn it? do you talk to me of the law of the nations! I fight after the law of nature, that teaches me to spend the last kernel of powder and the last drop of blood, in my country’s service.” His conqueror’s temper heated before, was inflamed by Stuart’s reply. He ordered him to be manacled and put into close confinement. This conduct may appear extraordinary in the commander of a British frigate, but the English, in their contest with the colonies were not always [37] governed by those generous principles, by which they have themselves so much alleviated the miseries of war. A defeated American was treated as a lawful enemy, or a rebel, as suited the individual temper of the conqueror. The frigate was so much injured in the fight as to render a refit necessary, and her commander sailed with his prize for Antigua. Stuart well knew that his fidelity to his country, rendered him obnoxious to the severest judgment from the admiralty court, and though he might plead the services he had rendered the ladies of the governor’s family in mitigation of his sentence, he proudly resolved never to advert to favours, which he had reason to believe had been lightly estimated. Spirits most magnanimous in prosperity are often most lofty in adversity. Frank Stuart, mutilated by wounds, dejected by the fatal calamities of his faithful crew, irritated by the indignities heaped on him by his unworthy captor, and stung by secret thoughts of some real or fancied injury—chafed and overburdened with many griefs, received, and sullenly obeyed a summons to the presence of the governor. It cannot be denied, that reluctantly as he appeared before the governor, he surveyed him at his introduction with a look of keen curiosity. He was not surprised to see a man rather past his prime, though not yet declined into the vale of years. With generous allow- [38] ance for the effect of a tropical climate, he might not have been more than forty-five. His physiognomy was agreeable, and his deportment gentlemanly. He received captain Stuart with far more courtesy than was often vouchsafed from an officer of the crown, to one who fought under the rebel banner, and remarking that he looked pale and sick, he begged him to be seated. Stuart declined the civility, and continued resting on a crutch, which a severe wound in his leg rendered necessary. “You are the commander of the schooner Betsy?” said the governor. “What’s left of him,” returned Stuart. “You appear to be severely wounded,” continued the governor. “Hacked to pieces,” rejoined Stuart, in a manner suited to the brevity of his reply. “Your name, I believe, is Frank Stuart?” “I have no reason to deny the name, thank God.” “And, thank God, I have reason to bless and honour it,” exclaimed the governor, advancing and grasping Frank’s hand heartily. “What metal did you deem me of, my noble friend, that I should forget such favours as you conferred on me, in the persons of my wife and mother.” “I have known greater favours than those forgotten,” said Frank, and the sudden illumination of his [39] pale face, showed how deeply he felt what he uttered. “Say you so!” exclaimed the governor with good humoured warmth; “well, but that I am too poor to pay my own debts to you, I should count it a pleasure to assume those of all my species—but heaven grant, my friend, that you do not allude to my wife and mother. I blamed them much for not bringing you on shore with them—but my mother is somewhat over punctilious, and my wife, poor soul! her nerves were so shattered by that sea-fight, that she is but now herself again. On my word, so far from wanting gratitude to you, she never hears an allusion to you without tears, the language women deal in when words are too cold for them. But come,” concluded the governor, for he found that all his efforts did but add to Stuart’s evident distress, “come, follow me to the drawing-room, the ladies will themselves convince you, how impatient they have been to welcome you.” “Are they apprised,” asked Stuart, still hesitating and holding back, “whom they are to see?” “That are they—my mother is as much delighted as if his majesty were in waiting, and my wife is weeping with joy.” “Perhaps,” said Stuart, still hesitating, “she would rather not see me now.” “Nonsense, my good friend, come along. It is not for a brave fellow like you to shrink from a few friendly tears from a woman’s eye.” [40] Nothing more could be urged, and Stuart followed governor Liston to the presence of the ladies. Lady Strangford rose and offered him her hand with the most condescending kindness. Mrs. Liston rose too, but did not advance till her husband said, “come Selina, speak your welcome to our benefactor—he may misinterpret this expression of your feelings.” “Oh no,” she said, now advancing eagerly, and fixing her eye on Stuart, while her cheeks, neck, and brow were suffused with crimson, “Oh no, Captain Stuart knows how deeply I must feel benefits, which none but he that bestowed them could forget or undervalue.” “It was a rule my mother taught me,” replied Frank with bluntness, softened however by a sudden gleam of pleasure, “that givers should not have better memories than receivers.” There was a meaning in his honest phrase hidden from two of his auditors, but quite intelligible to her for whom it was designed, and to our readers, who have doubtless already anticipated that the honourable Mrs. Liston was none other than the fugitive Perdita. A sudden change of colour showed that she felt acutely Stuart’s keen though veiled reproach. “A benefit,” she replied, still speaking in a double sense, “such as I have received from you, Captain Stuart, may be too deeply felt to be acknowledged by words—now heaven has given us the opportunity of deeds, and you shall find that my grati- [41] tude is only inferior to your merit.” Stuart was more accustomed to embody his feelings in action than speech, and he remained silent. He felt as if he were the sport of a dream, when he looked on the transformed Perdita. He knew not why, but invested as she now was, with all the power of wealth and the elegance of fashion, he felt not half the awe of her, as when in her helplessness and dependence, “he had fenced her rounde with many a spelle,” wrought by youthful and chivalric feeling. He perceived, in spite of Mrs. Liston’s efforts, that his presence was embarrassing to her, and he would have taken leave, but the governor insisted peremptorily on his remaining to dine with him. Then saying that he had indispensable business to transact, and must be absent for a half hour, he would, he said, “leave the ladies to the free expression of their feelings.” When he was gone, Mrs. Liston said to her mother, “I do not think your little favourite, Francis, is quite well to-day—will you have the goodness to look in upon him and give nurse some advice.” The old lady went without reluctance, as most people do to give advice, and Mrs. Liston turned to Stuart, and said, “I gave my boy your name, with a prayer that God would give him your spirit. Do not, oh do not think me,” she continued, her lip quivering with emotion, “the ungrateful wretch I have appeared. I am condemned to silence by the pride of another. [42] My heart rebels, but I am bound to keep that a secret, which my feelings prompt me to publish to the world.” Stuart would have spoken, but she anticipated him: “Listen to me without interruption,” she said, “my story is my only apology, and I have but brief space to tell it in. It was love, as you once guessed, that led me to that mad voyage to America. I had a silly passion for a young Virginian, who had been sent to England for his education—he was nineteen, I fifteen, when we promised to meet on board the ship which conveyed me to America. His purpose, but not his concert with me was discovered, and he was detained in England. You know all the events of my enterprise. I left a letter for my father, informing him that I had determined to abandon England, but I gave him not the slightest clue to my real designs. I was an only, and as you will readily believe, a spoiled child. My mother was not living, and my father hoping that I should soon return, and wishing to veil my folly, gave out that he has sent me to a boarding-school on the continent, and himself retired to Switzerland. When I arrived in London, I obtained his address and followed him. He immediately received me to apparent favour, but never restored me to his confidence. His heart was hardened by my childish folly, and though I recounted to him all my sufferings, I never drew a tear from him; but when I spoke of you, and dwelt on the particulars of your goodness to me, his eye would moisten, and he would exclaim, [43] ‘God bless the lad.’ I must be brief,” she continued, casting her eye apprehensively at the door; “Mr. Liston came with his mother to Geneva, where we resided; he addressed me—my father favoured his suit, and though he is, as you perceive, much older than myself, I consented to marry him, but not, as I told my father, till I had unfolded my history to him. My father was incensed at what he called my folly—he treated me harshly—I was subdued, and our contest ended in my solemnly swearing never to divulge the secret, on the preservation of which he fancied the honour of his proud name to depend.” “Thank God,” then exclaimed Frank with a burst of honest feeling, “it was not your pride, cursed pride, and I may still think on Perdita as a true, tender-hearted girl, it was a pleasant spot in my memory,” he continued, dashing away a tear, “and I hated to have it crossed with a black line.” Mrs. Liston improved all that remained of her mother’s absence in detailing some particulars, not necessary to relate, by which it appeared that notwithstanding she had dispensed with the article of love in her marriage, (we crave mercy of our fair young readers,) her husband’s virtue and indulgence had matured a sentiment of affection, if not as romantic, yet quite as safe and enduring as youthful passion. She assured Stuart that she regarded him as the means of all her happiness. “Not a day passes,” she said, raising her beautiful eyes to heaven, “that I do not [44] remember my generous deliverer, where alone I am permitted to speak of him.” The old lady now rejoined them, bringing her grandchild in her arms. Frank threw down his crutch, forgot his wounds, and permitted his full heart to flow out, in the caresses he lavished on his little namesake. The governor redeemed Stuart’s schooner, and made such representations before the admiralty court of Stuart’s merits, and of the ill treatment he had received from the commander of the frigate, that the court ordered the schooner to be refitted and equipped, and permitted to proceed to sea at the pleasure of captain Stuart. He remained for several days domesticated in the governor’s family, and treated by every member of it with a frank cordiality suited to his temper and merits. Every look, word and action of Mrs. Liston expressed to him, that his singular service was engraven on her heart. He forbore even to allude to it, and with his characteristic magnanimity never inquired, directly or indirectly, her family name. He observed a timidity and apprehensiveness in her manner that resulted from a consciousness that she had, however reluctantly, practiced a fraud on her husband, and he said “that having felt how burdensome it was to keep a secret from his commander for a short voyage, he thought it was quite too heavy a lading for the voyage of life.” The demonstrations of gratitude which Stuart received from governor Liston and his family, he deem- [45] ed out of all proportion to his services, and being more accustomed to bestow than to receive, he became restless, and as soon as his schooner was ready for sea, he announced his departure, and bade his friends farewell. He said that the tears that Perdita, (he always called her Perdita,) shed at parting, were far more precious to him than all the rich gifts she had bestowed on him. At the moment Stuart set his foot on the deck of his vessel, the American colours, at the governor’s command, were hoisted. The generous sympathies of the multitude were moved, and huzzas from a thousand voices rent the air. Governor Liston and his suite and most of the merchant vessels, then in port, escorted the schooner out of the harbour. Even the stern usages of war cannot extinguish that sentiment in the bosom of man, implanted by God, which leads him to do homage to a brave and generous foe. Captain Stuart continued to the end of the war, to serve his country with unabated zeal, and, when peace was restored, the same hardy spirit that had distinguished him in perilous times, made him foremost in bold adventure. He commanded the second American trading vessel that arrived at Canton after the peace; and this vessel with which he sailed over half the globe, was a sloop of eighty tons, little more than half the size of the largest now used for the river trade. This adventure will be highly estimated by those who have [46] been so fortu nate as to read the merry tale of Dolph Heilegher, and who remember the prudence manifested, at that period, by the wary Dutchmen in navigating these small vessels: how they were fain to shelter themselves at night in the friendly harbours with which the river abounds, and, we believe, to avoid adventuring through Haverstraw bay or the Tappan sea, in a high wind. When Stuart’s little sloop rode into the port of Canton, it was mistaken for a tender from a large ship, and the bold mariner was afterwards familiarly called by the great Hong merchants, “the one-mast captain.” _____ Fifty-seven years have gone by since the Hazard sailed from Oxford, and our hero is now enjoying in the winter of his life, the fruits of a summer of activity and integrity. Time, which he has well used, has used him gently—his hair is a little thinned and mottled, but is still a sufficient shelter to his honoured head. His eye when he talks of the past, (all good old men love to talk of the past,) rekindles with the fire of youth, his healthful complexion speaks his temperance, and a double row of unimpaired ivory, justifies the pleasant vanity of his boast, that he can still show his teeth to an enemy. Professional carelessness or generosity has left him little of the world’s ‘gear,’ but he is rich—for he is independent of riches. He says he would recom- [47] mend honest dealings and an open hand, to all who would lay up stores of pleasant thoughts for their old age; and he avers—and who will gainsay him, that in the silent watches of the night, the memory of money well bestowed is better than a pocket full of guineas. He loves to recount his boyish pranks, and recal his childish feelings—how he rattled down the chincapins on the devoted heads of a troop of little girls; and how he was whipped for crying to go with Braddock and be a soldier! but above all, he loves to dwell on some of the particulars we have related, and in the sincerity of religious feeling to ascribe praise to that being, who kept his youth within the narrow bound of strict virtue. I saw him last week surrounded by his grandchildren, recounting his imminent dangers and hair bread ‘scapes to a favourite boy, while the nimble fingers of rosy-cheeked, bright-eyed little girls were employed in making sails for a miniature ship, which the old man has just completed. Long may he enjoy the talisman that recals to his imagination, labour without its hardship, and enterprise without its failure—and God grant gentle breezes and a clear sky to the close of his voyage of life! Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Modern Chivalry Subject The topic of the resource Runaways, female virtue, chivalry, heroism, Revolutionary War. Description An account of the resource A young American sailor rescues a mysterious young female English runaway, and goes on to become a heroic naval captain in the Revolutionary War, and a later a prosperous merchant. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sedgwick, Catharine Maria. [By the author of Redwood] Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Atlantic Souvenir, 5-47 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available H. C. Carey & Lea Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1826 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Dr. Jenifer Elmore with Megan Konynenbelt, Sarah Selden, and Rachel Sakrisson; D. Gussman Relation A related resource Reprinted in New-York Mirror, edited by Horace Greeley, 25- Nov. 1826: 137-39. Collected in The Ladies' Monthly Museum, Vol. XXV pp. 260-264, 325-331 and Vol. XXVI pp. 29-36, 91-97, London: Dean and Munday, 1827. Collected in Lights and Shadows of American Life, vol.. 3, edited by Mary Russell Mitford, 226-73, London: H. Colburn and R. Bentley, 1832. Collected in Yorkshire Literary Annual for 1832, pp.202-232, edited by C. F. Edgar, London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Browne & Greene, 1832. Collected as "The Chivalric Sailor" in Sedgwick, Tales and Sketches, pp.237-78, Philadelphia: Carey, Lea, and Blanchard, 1835. Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Document 1826 A Winter's Tale Antigua Atlantic Souvenir Bacchus British colonies Canton Cape May Catholic Chesapeake Bay China Cowes cross-dressing disguise Dolph Heilegher Don Juan Canto II Ecclesiastes 9:11 Elk River England Gravesend Haverstraw Bay Henry IV Part I Hermione Historical fiction Hong merchants Hudson River indenture Isle of Wight John Paul Jones (1747-1792) Lord Byron Maryland Oliver Goldsmith Pasha Perdita Philadelphia plantation Pope Redwood: A Tale Revolutionary War Rodomontade novels Romance novels sailing sailors sentimentality servants Shakespeare shipwreck Sir Oracle Sir Toby Blech Sir Walter Scott slavery St. Kitts Storm tears Thames River The Heart of Midlothian The Merchant of Venice Twelfth Night Washington Irving West Indies https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/4347/archive/files/26296e72eac821b8bd9ce1c06a832d89.pdf?Expires=1781740800&Signature=mgeWV8XDcL3%7EVbYdLx9nqXNLcBRizUlv3SX%7EwC8mop6PQq2Y6pKeQsulPa8iHCMKf1JD1Fz8NbLRzRrgfk-aWXo09-iP1tuOTRXQwDG4xs-jLTUnnyDNMn0zeCYX0zOVLwzlwOXXg8r%7E8uE03DyQNamuXrHqHPWZVkpqk2LLBOdx5jIhOOSQprILqlm-XeWg5rK8Knz1WPqMn1GenqW9gaQPhv0s2zQH7KWEXfRnuhjHyixp-DXVPuaHoORxJ0k7G4Izj9HKA7YBjWrbx3E7N8AcgEXolO6Dzd%7EVX7zhpHuViQsvowhcPdz-BTQ-387SxkRRFpJOEFFv8bd3DFRctQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 593f10e894ae8f75bcb5f17e68213174 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1834 Document A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text. Text Any textual data included in the document. Old Maids. "To be the mistress of some honest man's house, and the means of making neighbours happy, the poor easy, and relieving strangers, is the most creditable lot a young woman can look to, and I heartily wish it to all here." — PIRATE. "Mrs. Seton, Emily Dayton is engaged to William Moreland!" "To William Moreland. Well, why should she not be engaged to William Moreland?" "Why should she, rather?" "I know not Emily Dayton's ' why, ' but ladies' reasons for marrying are as ' thick as blackberries.' A common motive with girls under twenty is the eclat of an engagement — the pleasure of being the heroine of bridal festivities — of receiving presents — of being called by that name so enchanting to the imagination of a miss in her teens — ' the bride.'" "But Emily Dayton, you know, is past twenty." "There is one circumstance that takes place of all reason — perhaps she is in love." "In love with William Moreland! No, no, Mrs. [18] Seton — there are no 'merry wanderers of the night' in these times to do Cupid's errands, and make us dote on that which we should hate." "Perhaps then, as she is at a rational age, three or four and twenty, she may be satisfied to get a kind sensible protector." "Kind and sensible, truly! He is the most testy, frumpish, stupid man you can imagine." "Does she not marry for an establishment?" "Oh no! She is perfectly independent, mistress of everything at her father's. No, I believe her only motive is that which actuates half the girls — the fear of being an old maid. This may be her last chance. Despair, they say, makes men mad — and I believe it does women too. "It is a fearful fate." "An old maid's? Yes, most horrible." "Pardon me, Anne, I did not mean that ; but such a fate as you anticipate for Emily Moreland — to be yoked in the most intimate relation of life, and for life, to a person to whom you have clung to save you from shipwreck, but whom you would not select to pass an evening with. To such a misery there can be no ' end, measure, limit, bound.'" "But, my dear Mrs. Seton, what are we to do? — all women cannot be so fortunate as you are." [19] "Perhaps not. But so kind is the system of compensation in this life — such the thirst for happiness, and so great the power of adaptation in the human mind, that the conjugal state is far more tolerable than we should expect when we see the mismated parties cross its threshold. Still there can be no doubt that its possible happiness is often missed, and such is my respect for my sex, and so high my estimate of the capabilities of married life, that I cannot endure to see a woman, from the fear of being an old maid, driven into it, thereby forfeiting its highest blessings." "You must nevertheless confess, Mrs. Seton, that there are terrors in the name." "Yes, I know there are; and women are daily scared by them into unequal and wretched connexions. They have believed they could not retain their identity after five and twenty. That unless their individual existence was merged in that of the superior animal, every gift and grace with which God has endowed them would exhale and leave a 'spectral appearance' — a sort of slough of woman — an Aunt Grizzel, or Miss Lucretia McTab. I have lived, my dear Anne, to see many of the mists of old superstitions melting away in the light of a better day. Ghost is no longer a word to conjure with — [20] witches have settled down into harmless and unharmed old women; and I do not despair of living to see the time when it shall be said of no woman breathing, as I have heard it said of such and such a lady, who escaped from the wreck at the eleventh hour, that she 'married to die a Mrs.'" "I hate, too, to hear such things said, but tell me honestly, Mrs. Seton, now when no male ears are within hearing, whether you do not, in your secret soul, think there is something particularly unlovely, repelling, and frightful, in the name of an old maid." "In the name, certainly; but it is because it does not designate a condition but a species. It calls up the idea of a faded, bony, wrinkled, skinny, jaundiced personage, whose mind has dwindled to a point — who has outlived her natural affections — survived every love but love of self, and self-guarded by that Cerberus suspicion — in whom the follies of youth are fresh when all its charms are gone — who has retained, in all their force, the silliest passions of the silliest women — love of dress, of pleasure, of admiration; who, in short, is in the condition of the spirits in the ancients' Tartarus, an impalpable essence tormented with the desires of humanity. Now turn, my dear Anne, from this hideous picture to [21] some of our acquaintance who certainly have missed the happiest destiny of woman, but who dwell in light, the emanation of their own goodness. I shall refer you to actual living examples — no fictions." "No fictions, indeed, for then you must return to the McTabs and Grizzles. Whatever your philanthropy may hope for that most neglected portion of our sex, no author has ventured so far from nature as to portray an attractive old maid. Even Mackenzie, with a spirit as gentle as my Uncle Toby's, and as tender as that of his own 'Man of Feeling,' has written an essay in ridicule of 'old maids.'" "And you are not perhaps aware, Anne, that he has written a poem called the ' Recantation,' and dedicated it to his single daughter, a most lovely woman, who was the staff and blessing of his old age. In your wide range of reading cannot you think of a single exception to the McTabs and Grizzles?" "Miss Farrer's 'Becca Duguid,' but she is scarcely above contempt, trampled on by the children, and the tool of their selfish and lazy mammas." "There is one author, Anne, the most beloved, and the most lamented of all authors, who has not ventured to depart from nature, but has escaped prejudice, and prejudice in some of its most prevailing [22] forms. He has dared to exhibit the Paynim Saladin as superior to the Christian crusader. He has dispelled the thick clouds that enveloped the ' poor Israelite,' the most inveterate of all prejudices, transmitted from age to age, and authorised by the fancied sanctions of religion. I said the clouds were dispelled, but do they not rather hang around the glorious Rebecca, the unsullied image of her Maker, as the clouds that have broken away from the full moon encircled her, and are converted by her radiance to a bright halo?" "Mrs. Seton! Mrs. Seton! you are, or I am getting lost in all this mist and fog. What have Paynims and Jews to do with old maids? I do not remember an old maid in all Sir Walter's novels, excepting, indeed, Alison — Martha Trapbois — Meg Dods — one of Monkbarns' womankind, and Miss Yellowley, a true all-saving, fidgeting, pestering old maid, and the rest of them are entertaining but certainly not very exalting members of any sisterhood." "But these are not my examples, Anne. I confess that they are fair examples of follies and virtues that, if not originated, are exaggerated and made conspicuous by single life. I confess too that for such foibles matrimony is often a kind and safe shelter. [23] But to my examples. Sir Walter — and who is more poetically just than Sir Walter? — has abandoned to the desolate, tragic, and most abhorred fate of old maids, his three first female characters — first in all respects, in beauty, in mind, in goodness, first in our hearts. The accomplished Flora M'lvor — the peer less Rebecca, and the tender, beautiful Minna." "Bless me! I never thought of this." "No, nor has one in a thousand of the young ladies who have admired these heroines laid the moral of their story to heart. Perhaps not one of the fair young creatures who has dropped a tear over the beautiful sentence that closes the history of Minna,* has been conscious that she was offering involuntary homage to the angelic virtues of an old maid. The very term would have wrought a disenchanting spell." "I confess, Mrs. Seton, I am in what is vulgarly called a ' blue maze.' My perceptions are as imperfect as the man's in scripture who was suddenly cured of blindness. Besides I was never particu-- * [Sedgwick's note] "Thus passed her life, enjoying, from all who approached her, an affection enhanced by reverence, insomuch that when her friends sorrowed for her death, which arrived at a late period of her existence, they were comforted by the fond reflection, that the humanity which she then laid down, was the only circumstance which had placed her, in the words of scripture, ' A little lower than the angels.'" [23] larly skilful at puzzling out a moral; will you have the goodness to extract it for me?" "Certainly, Anne, as I am the lecturer, this is my duty. First, I would have young ladies believe that all beautiful and loveable young women do not of course get married — that charms and virtues may exist, and find employment in single life — that a single woman, an old maid, (I will not eschew the name,) may love and be loved if she has not a husband, and children of her own. I would have her learn that if, like Flora M'lvor, she has been surrounded by circumstances that have caused her thoughts and affections to flow in some other channel than love, she need not wed a chance Waverly to escape single life; that if, like Rebecca, she is separated by an impassable gulf from him she loves, she need not wed one whom she does not love, but like the high souled Jewess she may transmute ' young Cupid's fiery shafts,' to chains that shall link her to all her species; and if like poor Minna she has thrown away her affections on a worthless object, she may live on singly, and so well that she will be deemed but ' little lower than the angels.' "After all it is not such high natures as these that need to be fortified by argument, or example. They are born equal to either fortune. But I would en-- [25] treat all my sex — those even who have the fewest and smallest gifts — to reverence themselves, to remember that it is not so much the mode of their brief and precarious existence that is important, as the careful use of those faculties that make existence a blessing here, and above all hereafter, where there is certainly 'no marrying, nor giving in marriage;' but I am growing serious, and of course, I fear, tiresome to young ears." "Oh, no, no, Mrs. Seton. These are subjects on which girls are never tired of talking nor listening; besides, you know you promised me some examples — such as Miss Hamilton and Miss Edgeworth, I suppose." "No, Anne, these belong to the great exceptions I have mentioned, 'equal to either fortune,' who, in any condition, would have made their 'owne renowne, and happie days.'" I could adduce a few in our own country, known to both of us, who are the ornament of the high circles in which they move, but for obvious reasons I select humble persons — those who, like some little rivulet unknown to fame, bless obscure and sequestered places. There is Violet Flint — I always wondered how she came by so appropriate a name. That little [26] flower is a fit emblem for her — smiling in earliest spring, and in latest fall — requiring no culture, and yet rewarding it — neglected and forgotten when the gay tribes of summer are caressed, and yet always looking from its humble station with the same cheerful face — bright and constant through the sudden reverses of autumn, and the adversity of the roughest winter. Such is the flower, and such is Violet Flint. But as I am now in realities, I must call her by the old maidenish appellation that, spoiling her pretty name, they have given to her, 'Miss Vily.' She lives, and has for the last twenty years lived, with her brother Sam. He married young, a poor invalid, who, according to Napoleon's scale of merit, is a great woman, having given to the commonwealth nine or ten — more or less — goodly sons and daughters. After the children were born, all care of them, and of their suffering mother, devolved on Violet. Without the instincts, the claims, the rights, or the honours of a mother, she has not only done all the duties of a mother, but done them on the sure and broad basis of love. She has toiled and saved, and made others comfortable and enjoying, while she performed the usually thankless task of ordering the economy of a very frugal household. She has made the happy happier, tended the sick, [27] and solaced the miserable. She sheltered the weak, and if one of the children strayed she was the apologist and intercessor. With all this energy of goodness the cause is lost in the blessed effects — she never appears to claim applause or notice. She is not only second best; but when indulgence or pleasure is to be distributed, her share is last and least — that is, according to the usual selfish reckoning. But according to a truer and nobler scale, her amount is greatest, for she has her share in whatever happiness she sees in any living thing." How many married dames are there who repeat every fifteen minutes, my husband, my children, my house, and glorify themselves in all these little personalities, who might lay down their crowns at the feet of Violet Flint ! — Miss Vily, the old maid. "The second example that occurs to me, is Sarah Lee. Sarah has not, like Violet, escaped all the peculiarities that are supposed to characterise the 'Single-sides.' With the chartered rights of a married lady to fret, to be particular, and to have a way of her own, her temper would pass without observation; but being an old maid, she is called, and I must confess is, rather touchy. But what are these sparks, when the same fire that throws [28] them off keeps warm an overflowing stream of benevolence? — look into her room." "Oh, Mrs. Seton! I have seen it, and you must con fess it is a true 'Singleside' repository." "Yes, I do confess it — nor will I shrink from the confession, for I wish to select for my examples, not any bright particular star, but persons of ordinary gifts, in the common walks of life. Had Sarah been married she would have been a thrifty wife, and pains taking mother, but she wore away her youth in devotion to the sick and old — and now her kindness, like the miraculous cruise, always imparting and never diminishing, is enjoyed by all within her little sphere. Experience has made her one of the best physicians I know. She keeps a variety of labelled medicines for the sick, plasters and salves of her own compounding, and materials with which she concocts food and beverages of every description, nutritious and diluent; in short, she has some remedy or solace for every ill that flesh is heir to. She has a marvelous knack of gathering up fragments, of most ingeniously turning to account what would be wasted in another's hands. She not only has comfortables for shivering old women, and well patched clothes for neglected children, but she has always some pretty favour for a bride — some kind [29] token for a new-born baby. And then what a refuge is her apartment for the slip-shod members of the family who are in distress for scissors, penknife, thimble, needle, hook and eye, buttons, a needle-full of silk or worsted of any particular colour. How many broken hearts she has restored with her inexhaustible glue-pot — mending tops, doll's broken legs, and all the luckless furniture of the baby-house — to say nothing of a similar ministry to the 'minds dis eased' of the mammas. Sarah Lee's labours are not always in so humble a sphere — 'He who makes two blades of grass grow where one grew before,' says a political economist, 'is a benefactor to his race.' If so, Sarah Lee takes high rank. "Two blades of grass! Her strawberry beds produce treble the quantity of any other in the village. Her potatoes are the ' greatest yield' — her corn the earliest — her peas the richest — her squashes the sweetest — her celery the tenderest — her raspberries and currants the greatest bearers in the country. There is not a thimble-full of unoccupied earth in her garden. There are flowers of all hues, seasons, and climes. None die — none languish in her hands. "My dear Anne, I will not ask you if an existence so happy to herself, so profitable to others, [30] should be dreaded by herself, neglected or derided by others. Yet Sarah Lee is an old maid." "You are, I confess, very happy in your instances, Mrs. Seton, but remember the old proverb, 'one swallow does not make a summer.'" "I have not done yet — and you must remember that in our country, where the means of supporting a family are so easily attained, and when there are no entails to be kept up at the expense of half a dozen single sisters, the class of old maids is a very small one. Many enter the ranks, but they drop off in the natural way of matrimony. Few maintain the 'perseverance of saints.' Among those few is one, who, when she resigns the slight covering that invests her spirit, will lay down 'all she has of humanity' — our excellent friend, Lucy Ray. "She is now gently drawing to the close of a long life, which I believe she will offer up without spot or blemish. She began life with the most fragile constitution. She has had to contend with' that nervous susceptibility of temperament that so naturally engenders selfishness and irascibility, and all the miseries and weaknesses of invalidism. Not gifted with any personal beauty, or grace, she was liable to envy her more fortunate cotemporaries. Without genius, talents, or accomplishments to at-- [31] tract or delight, she has often been slighted — and what is far worse, must have been always liable to the suspicion of slights. But suspicion, that creator and purveyor of misery, never darkened her serene mind. She has lived in others and for others, with such an entire forgetfulness of self that even the wants and weakness of her mortal part seem scarcely to have intruded on her thoughts. She has resided about in the families of her friends — a mode of life which certainly has a tendency to nourish jealousy, servility, and gossipping. But for what could Lucy Ray be jealous or servile? She craved'' nothing — she asked nothing, but, like an unseen, unmarked Providence, to do good ; and as to gossipping, she had no turn for the ridiculous, no belief of evil against any human being — and as to speaking evil, 'on her lips was the law of kindness.' You would hardly think, Anne, that a feeble, shrinking creature, such as I have described, and truly, Lucy Ray, could have been desired, as an inmate with gay young people, and noisy, turbulent children. She was always welcome, for, like her Divine Master, she came to minister — not to be ministered unto. "Lucy, like the Man of Ross, is deemed passing rich by the children, and an unfailing resource to the poor in their exigencies, though her income [32] amounts to rather less than one hundred dollars!! "We sometimes admire the art of the Creator more in the exquisite mechanism of an insect than in the formation of a planet, and I have been more struck with the power of religion in the effect and exaltation it gave to the humble endowments of this meek woman, than by its splendid results in such a life as Howard's. Lucy Ray, by a faithful imitation of her master, by always aiding and never obstructing the principle of growth in her soul, has, through every discouragement and disability, reached a height but 'little lower than the angels;' and when her now flickering light disappears, she will be lamented almost as tenderly (alas! for that almost) as if she were a mother; and yet, Anne, Lucy Ray is an old maid." "You half persuade me to be one too, Mrs. Seton." "No, Anne, I would by no means persuade you or any woman to prefer single life. It is not the 'prim rose path.' Nothing less than a spirit of meekness, of self-renunciation, and of benevolence, can make a woman, who has once been first, happy in a subordinate and second best position. And this under ordinary circumstances is the highest place [33] of a single woman. Depend upon it, my dear young friend, it is safer for most of us to secure all the helps to our virtues that attend a favourable position; besides, married life is the destiny Heaven has allotted to us, and therefore best fitted to awaken all our powers, to exercise all our virtues, and call forth all our sympathies. I would persuade you that you may give dignity and interest to single life, that you may be the cause of happiness to others, and of course happy yourself — for when was the fountain dry while the stream continued to flow? If single life, according to the worst view of it, is a moral desert, the faithful, in their passage through it, are refreshed with bread from Heaven and water from the rock. "I shall conclude with a true story. The parties are not known to you. The incidents occurred long ago, and I shall take the liberty to assume names; for I would not, even at this late day, betray a secret once confided to me, though time may long since have outlawed it. My mother had a school-mate and friend whom I shall call Agnes Grey. Her father was a country clergyman with a small salary, and the blessing that usually attends it — a large family of children. Agnes was the eldest, and after her following a line of boys, as long as Ban-- [34] quo's. At least, some ten years after Agnes, long waited and prayed for, appeared a girl, who cost her mother her life. "The entire care of the helpless little creature devolved on Agnes. She had craved the happiness of possessing a sister, and now, to a sister's love, she added the tenderness of a mother. Agnes' character was formed by the discipline of circumstances — the surest of all discipline. A host of turbulent boys, thoughtless and impetuous, but kind-hearted, bright, and loving, had called forth her exertions and affections, and no one can doubt, either as lures or goads, had helped her on the road to heaven. Nature had, happily, endowed her with a robust constitution, and its usual accompaniment, a sweet temper; so that what were mountains to others, were mole hills to Agnes. 'The baby,' of course, was the pet lamb of the fold. She was named, for her mother, Elizabeth; but, instead of that queenly appellation, she was always addressed by the endearing diminutive of Lizzy. Lizzy Gray was not only the pet of father, brothers, and sister at home — but the plaything of the village. "The old women knit their brightest yarn into tippets and stockings for the ' minister's motherless little one' (oh, what an eloquent appeal was in [35] those words!) the old men saved the ' red cheeked' apples for her — the boys drew her, hour after hour, in her little wagon, and the girls made her rag babies. Still she was not in any disagreeable sense an enfant gatee. She was like those flowers that thrive best in warm and continued sunshine. Her soft hazel eye, with its dark sentimental lashes, the clear brunette tint of her complexion, and her graceful flexible lips, truly ex pressed her tender, loving, and gentle spirit. She seemed formed to be sheltered and cherished — to love and be loved; and this destiny appeared to be secured to her by her devoted sister, who never counted any exertion or sacrifice that procured an advantage or pleasure for Lizzy. When Lizzy was about fourteen, a relative of the family, who kept a first rate boarding school in the city, offered to take her for two years, and give her all the advantages of her school, for the small consideration of fifty dollars per annum. Small as it was, it amounted to a tithe of the parson's income. It is well known, that, in certain parts of our country, everything (not always discreetly) is sacrificed to the hobby — education. Still the prudent father, who had already two sons at college, hesitated — did not consent till Agnes ascertained that by keeping a little school in the village she might obtain [36] half the required sum. Her father, brothers, and friends all remonstrated. The toils of a school, in addition to the care and labour of her father's family, was, they urged, too much for her — but she laughed at them. 'What was labour to her if she could benefit Lizzy — dear Lizzy!' All ended, as might be expected, in Lizzy going to the grand boarding school. The parting was a great and trying event in the family. It was soon followed by a sadder. The father suddenly sickened and died — and nothing was left for his family hut his house and well kept little garden. What now was to be done?— - College and schools to be given up? — No such thing. In our country, if a youth is rich he ought to be educated; if he is poor he must be. The education is the capital whereby they are to live hereafter. It is obtained in that mysterious but unfailing way — ' by hook and by crook.'" The elder Grays remained in college — Agnes enlarged her school — learned lessons in mathematics and Latin one day, and taught them the next ; took a poor, accomplished young lady from some broken down family in town into partnership, and received a few young misses as boarders into her family. Thus, she not only was able to pay ' dear Lizzy's' bills regularly, but to aid her younger brothers. Her [37] energy and success set all her other attractions in a strong light, and she was admired and talked about, and became quite the queen of the village. "I think it was about a year after her father's death, that a Mr. Henry Orne, a native of the village, who was engaged in a profitable business at the south, returned to pass some months at his early home. His frequent visits to the parsonage, and his attentions, on all occasions, to Agnes, soon became matter of very agreeable speculation to the gossips of the village. 'What a fine match he would be for Agnes! — such an engaging, well-informed young man, and so well off!' Agnes' heart was not steel; but though it had been exposed to many a flame she had kindled, in had never yet melted." "Pardon me, Mrs. Seton, for interrupting you — was Agnes pretty?" "Pretty? The word did not exactly suit her. At the time of which I am now speaking, she was at the mature age of five and twenty; which is called the perfection of womanhood. Prettiness is rather appropriate to the bud than the ripened fruit. Agnes, I have been told, had a fine person — symmetrical features, and so charming an expression that she was not far from beautiful, in the eyes of strangers, and quite a beauty to her friends and lovers. [38] Whether it were beauty, manners, mind, or heart, I know not — one and all probably — but Henry Orne soon became her assiduous and professed admirer. Till now Agnes had lived satisfied and happy with subordinate affections. She had never seen anyone that she thought it possible she could love as well as she loved those to whom nature had allied her. But now the sun arose, and other lights became dim — not 'that she loved Caesar less, but she loved Rome more.' Their mutual faith was plighted, and both believed, as all real lovers do, that the world never contained so happy, so blessed a pair, as they were. "Lizzy's second year at school was nearly ended, and one month after her return the marriage was to be solemnised. In the meantime Agnes was full of the cares of this world. The usual preparations for the greatest occasion in a woman's life are quite enough for any single pair of hands, but Agnes had to complete her school term, and the possibility of swerving from an engagement never occurred to her. "Lizzy arrived, as lovely a creature as she had appeared in the dreams of her fond sister. In the freshness and untouched beauty of her young existence, just freed from the trammels of school, her [39] round cheek glowing with health, and her heart overflowing with happiness. 'Here is my own dear Lizzy,' said Agnes, as she presented her to Henry Orne, 'and if you do not love me for anything else, you must for giving you such a sister.' "Henry Orne looked at Lizzy and thought, and said, ' the duty would be a very easy one.' 'For the next month,' continued Agnes, 'I shall be incessantly occupied, and you must entertain one another. Henry has bought a nice little pony for me, Lizzy, and he shall teach you to ride, and you shall go over all his scrambling walks with him — to Sky-cliff, Rose- glen, and Beech-cove — the place he says nature made for lovers; but my poor lover has had to accommodate himself to my working day life and woo me in beaten paths.' "The next month was the most joyous of Lizzy's life; every day was a festival. To the perfection of animal existence in the country, in the month of June, was added the keen sense of all that physical nature conveys to the susceptible mind. "Wherever she was, her sweet voice was heard ringing in laughter, or swelling in music that seemed the voice of irrepressible joy — the spontaneous breathing of her soul. To the lover approaching his marriage day Time is apt to drag along with [40] leaden foot, but to Henry Orne he seemed rather to fly with Mercury's wings at his heels; and when Agnes found herself compelled by the accumulation of her affairs, to defer her wedding for another month, he submitted with a better grace than could have been expected. Not many days of this second term had elapsed, when Agnes, amidst all her cares, as watchful of Lizzy as a mother of an only child, observed a change stealing over her. Her stock of spirits seemed suddenly ex pended, her colour faded — her motions were languid, and each successive day she became more and more dejected. 'She wants rest,' said Agnes to Henry Orne; she has been unnaturally excited, and there is now a reaction. She must remain quietly at home for a time, on the sofa, in a darkened room, and you, Henry, I am sure, will, for my sake, give up your riding and walking for a few days, and stay within doors, and play on your flute, and read to her.' Agnes' suggestions were promptly obeyed, but without the happy effect she anticipated. Lizzy, who had never before had a cloud on her brow, seemed to have passed under a total eclipse. She became each day more sad and nervous. A tender word from Agnes — a look, even, would make her burst into tears. "'I am miserable, Henry,' said Agnes, ' at this [41] unaccountable change in Lizzy — the doctor says she is perfectly free from disease — perhaps we have made too sudden a transition from excessive exercise to none at all. The evening is dry and fine, I wish you would induce her to take a walk with you. She is distressed at my anxiety, and I cannot propose any thing that does not move her to tears.' "'It is very much the same with me,' replied Henry, sighing deeply, but if you wish it I will ask her.' He accordingly did so — she consented, and they went out together. "Agnes retired to her own apartment, and there, throwing herself upon her knees, she entreated her Heavenly Father to withdraw this sudden infusion of bitterness from her brimming cup of happiness. 'Try me in any other way,' she cried, in the intensity of her feeling, and, for the first time in her life, forgetting that every petition should be in the spirit of ' Thy will be done,' 'try me in any other way, but show me the means of restoring my sister — my child to health and happiness!' "She returned again to her little parlour. Lizzy had not come in, and she sat down on the sofa near an open window, and resigned herself to musings, the occupation, if occupation it may be called, of the idle, but rarely, and never of late, Agnes! [42] In a few moments Lizzy and Henry returned, and came into the porch, adjoining the parlour. They perceived the candles were not lighted, and concluding Agnes was not there, they sat down in the porch.' "'Oh, I am too wretched!' said Lizzy. Her voice was low and broken, and she was evidently weeping. 'Is it possible,' thought Agnes, ' that she will express her feelings more freely to Henry than to me? I will listen. If she knows any cause for her dejection, I am sure I can remove it.' "'Why, my beloved Lizzy,' replied Orne, in a scarcely audible voice, 'will you be so wretched — why will you make me so, and forever, when there is a remedy?' "'Henry Orne!' she exclaimed, and there was resolution and indignation in her voice. 'If you name that to me again, I will never, so help me God, permit you to come into my presence without witnesses. No, there is no remedy, but in death. Would that it had come before you told me you loved me — before my lips confessed my sinful love for you — no, no — the secret shall be buried in my grave.; "'Oh, Lizzy, you are mad — Agnes does not, cannot love as we do. Why sacrifice two to one? Let [43] me, before it is too late, tell her the whole, and cast myself on her generosity.' '"Never, never — I now wish, when I am in her presence, that the earth at her feet would swallow me up; and how can you, for a moment, think I will ask to be made happy — that I could be made happy, at her expense ? No, I am willing to expiate with my life, my baseness to her — that I shall soon do so is my only comfort — and you will soon forget me — men can forget, they say —' "'Never — on my knees, I swear never!' — "'Stop, for mercy's sake, stop. You must not speak another such word to me — I will not hear it.' She rose to enter the house. Agnes slipped through a private passage to her own apartment. "She heard Lizzy ascending the stairs. She heard Henry call after her, ' One word, Lizzy — for mercy's sake, one last word.' But Lizzy did not turn. Agnes heard her feebly drag herself into the little dressing- room adjoining their apartment, and after, there was no sound but the poor girl's suppressed, but still audible sobs. "None but He who created the elements that compose the human heart, and who can penetrate its mysterious depths, can know which of the sisters was most wretched at that moment. To Agnes who [44] had loved deeply, confidingly without a shadow of fear or distrust, the reverse was total. To Lizzy who had enjoyed for a moment the bewildering fervours of a young love, only to feel its misery, that misery was embittered by a sense of wrong done to her sister. And yet it had not been a willing, but an involuntary and resisted, and most heartily repented wrong. She had recklessly rushed down a steep to a fearful precipice, and now felt that all access and passage to return was shut against her. Agnes without having had one dim fear — without any preparation, saw an abyss yawning at their feet — an abyss only to be closed by her self-immolation. "She remained alone for many hours — she resolved — her spirit faltered — she re-resolved. She thought of all Lizzy had been to her, and of all she had been to Lizzy, and she wept as if her heart would break. She remembered the prayer that her impatient spirit had sent forth that evening. She prayed again, and a holy calm, never again to be disturbed, took possession of her soul. "There is a power in goodness, pure self-renouncing goodness, that cannot be ' overcome, but overcometh all things.' "Lizzy waited till all was quiet in her sister's room. She heard her get into bed, and then stole [45] softly to her. Agnes, as she had done from Lizzy's infancy, opened her arms to receive her, and Lizzy pillowed her aching head on Agnes' bosom, softly breathing, — 'My sister — mother !' "'My own Lizzy — my child' answered Agnes. There was no tell-tale faltering of the voice. She felt a tear trickle from Lizzy's cold cheek on to her bosom, and not very long after both sisters were in a sleep that mortals might envy, and angels smile on. "The rest you will anticipate, my dear Anne. The disclosure to the lovers of her discovery, was made by Agnes in the right way, and at the right time. Everything was done as it should be by this most admirable woman. She seemed, indeed, to feel as a guardian angel might, who, by some remission of his vigilance, had suffered the frail mortal in his care to be beguiled into evil. She never, by word, or even look, reproached Lizzy. She shielded her, as far as possible, from self-reproach, nor do I believe she ever felt more unmixed tenderness and love for her, than when, at the end of a few months, she saw her married to Henry Orne. "My story has yet a sad supplement. Madame Cotin, I believe it is, advises a story teller to close the tale when he comes to a happy day; for, she says, it is not probable another will succeed it. [46] Poor Lizzy had experience of this sad mutability of human life. Hers was checquered with many sorrows. "Lapses from virtue at eight and twenty, and at sixteen, afford very different indications of the character; you cannot expect much from a man, who, at eight and twenty, acted the part of Henry Orne. He was unfaithful in engagements with persons less merciful than Agnes Gray. He became inconstant in his pursuits — self-indulgent, and idle, and finally intemperate, in his habits. His wife — as wives will — loved him to the end. "Agnes retained her school, which had become in her hands a profitable establishment. There she laboured, year after year, with a courageous heart, and serene countenance, and devoted the fruit of all her toils to Lizzy, and to the education of her children. "I am telling no fiction, and I see you believe me, for the tears are trembling in your eyes — do not re press them, but permit them to embalm the memory of an old maid.” Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource "Old Maids" Subject The topic of the resource Sacrifice, stigma towards unmarried women, alternatives to marriage. Description An account of the resource Two women are discussing the negative views of old maids, and one gives the sad account of an old maid who gave up her true love for the happiness of her sister, and the unintended consequences of that sacrifice for all of the parties involved. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sedgwick, Catharine M. Miss Sedgwick Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived “Old Maids,” <em>The Offering, </em> 17-46, Philadelphia, Thomas T. Ash, 1834. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1834 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource J. Robinson; D. Gussman Relation A related resource Annual reissued as <em>The Wreath of Friendship</em>, 1837.<br />Reprinted in <em>The Casket</em>, March 1834, 137-139 and<br /><em>Tales and Sketches </em>by Catharine Maria Sedgwick, Philadelphia: Carey, Lea and Blanchard, 1835: 97-116.<br />Collected in <em>Old Maids: Short Stories by Nineteenth-Century U.S. Women Writers</em>, ed. Susan Koppelman, Boston: Pandora Press, 1984: 11-26. Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Document "Madame Cotin" [Sophie Ristaud Cottin] "Man of Ross" [John Kyrle] boarding school heaven Jew John MacKenzie marriage Napoleon old maid prayer sacrifice singlehood Sir Walter Scott sisters teaching tears The Offering The Pirate virtue Waverley Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1834 Document A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text. Text Any textual data included in the document. "All is best though oft we doubt, What th' unsearchable dispose Of highest wisdom brings about, And ever best found in the close." -MILTON. "On trouve dans la chronique de Raoul, Abbe de Coggeshall, sous cette annee (1201) une histoire touchante qui montre a quel point I'enseignement religieux pouvoit etre perverti, et combien le Clerge etoit loin d'etre le gardien des moeurs publiques." EARLY in the 13th century Agnes de Meran, the mistress-wife of Philip Augustus, held her court at the Chateau des roses Sur-Seine, not many leagues from Paris. The arts and luxuries of the time were lavished on this residence of the favourite. On one side of the Chateau, and leading out of the garden attached to it, was a winding walk, embowered by grape vines which, not being native in the north of France, and the art by which the gardener now triumphs over soil and climate being then in its infancy, were cultivated with great pains and royal expense. The walk, after extending some hundred yards, opened on a sloping ground, bounded by the Seine, and tastefully planted with shrubs and vines formed into arbours and bowers of every imaginable shape. The whole plantation was called Larigne. Parallel to a part of it ran the highway, hidden by a wall, excepting where it traversed an arched stone bridge that spanned the Seine, and which was itself almost embowered by tall acacias, planted at either end of it. Late in the afternoon of a September day, when the warm air was perfumed with autumnal fruits, and the sun glancing athwart the teeming vines, shot its silver beams across the green sward, and seemed, by some alchemy of the flowers to become molten gold as it touched their leaves, tinted with deep autumnal dyes; two ladies, followed by a Moorish servant girl, issued from the walk. The eldest was tall and thin. The soft round lines of youth had given place to the angles of forty; but though she had lost the beauty, she had retained the grace (happily that charm is perennial) of youth, and added to it the fitting quality of matronly dignity. Born in Provence, she was an exception to the general hue of its natives, her complexion having an extreme fairness, and a texture as delicate as that of infancy. She had that organ, to which the Phrenologist is pleased to assign the religious sentiment, strikingly developed; but a surer indication of a tendency to spiritual abstraction, was expressed in her deep set, intellectual, and rather melancholy eye. Her mouth, when closed, expressed firmness and decision, but, when in play, the gentlest and tenderest of human affections; and the voice that proceeded from it was the organ of her soul, and expressed its divine essence — love. Such was the lady Clotilde — the martyr, who would have been the canonized saint, had she died in the bosom of the Orthodox Church. The other female was a girl of sixteen, Rosalie, the daughter of Clotilde, and resembling her in nothing but the purity and spirituality of her expression. Her complexion was of the tint which the vulgar call fair, and the learned Thebans in such matters, brunette; her eyes were the deepest blue, and her eye-lashes long and so black, that in particular lights they imparted their hue to her eyes. Her hair, we are told, was of the colour that harmonized with her skin — what that hue was we are left to imagine. Her features, neck, and whole person (the feet and hands are dilated on with a lover's prolixity) the chronicle describes as cast in beauty's mould, "so that he who once looked on this fair ladye Rosalie saw imperfection in all other creatures," Rosalie led, by her hand, a little girl of four years, a cherub in beauty. "Why, dear mama," said Rosalie, "are you so silent and thoughtful? — and tell me — pray — why were you so cold to our sweet lady queen to-day, when she bade us prepare the fete for the king? — I would not pry into secrets, but when she spake low to you, did she not say something of sad looks not suiting festive days?" "She did, Rosalie — and yet she well knows they are but too fitting. Let us seat ourselves here, my child, and while Zeba looks after Marie I will entrust you with what is better suited to your discretion than your years." — She beckoned to Zeba to relieve them from the child, but little Marie, a petted favourite of Rosalie's sprang on the bench and clung around her neck, till she was won away by a promise of a game of "hide and go seek," among the vines and shrubs. "Rosalie," continued the mother, pointing to Marie, "that child is not the offspring of a union which man deems honourable, and calls marriage, and which it pleases heaven, my child, to authorize to humanity in some stages of its weakness and ignorance, but she is — I hesitate to speak it to your pure ears — the fruit of illicit love." "Mother! what mean you? — She is surely the child of our good lord king and of his wife — our lady Agnes and our queen?" "Our lady Agnes de Meran, Rosalie, but not his wife — nor our rightful queen." "You should not have told me this! — you should not have told me this!" reiterated Rosalie, covering her eyes from which the tears gushed, "I loved her so well! — and Marie! — oh you should not have told me!" "My dear Rosalie, I have withheld it as long as I dared. The world to you is as a paradise, and I shrunk from exposing to you the traces of sin and evil that are upon it. But evil — temptation must approach you and how are you to resist it, if you know not its existence? Listen patiently, my dear child. There is much in the story of our lady to excuse her with those compromising consciences that weigh sin against temptation; and much to make her pitied by those who weigh the force of temptation against the weakness of humanity." "I am sure I shall pity her," interrupted Rosalie. "Beware, my child. Pity, the gentlest spirit of heaven, sometimes loses her balance in leaning too far on the side of humanity." "But pity is heaven-born, dear mother." Clotilde did not reply, for she had not the heart to repress the instincts of Rosalie's affections; and Rosalie added, "I am sure our lady Agnes has sinned unwittingly." "Alas, my child! — But listen — I must make my tale a brief one. Our royal master, who in his festive hours appears to us so kind and gracious, is stained with crimes, miscalled virtues by his blind guides and false friends." "Crimes, mother?" "Yes, Rosalie, crimes — persecution and murder misnamed, by his uncle of Rheims, zeal — cruelty, rapine, excess, and what I will not name to thy maiden ears. He was anointed king in the blood of his subjects — for les fetes de la Toussaint, when he was crowned, were scarcely past when, set on by the Arch bishop, he commanded his soldiers to surround the synagogues of the Jews, on their Sabbath-day, to drag them to prison, and rob them of their gold and silver to replenish the coffers which his father Louis had emptied for offerings to the church. The Jews hoped it was a passing storm, but the king ordered them to sell all they possessed, and with their wives and little ones to leave his dominions. Their property was sacrificed, not sold, and our royal master received the benedictions of the priests! The next objects of his zeal were the violators of the third commandment — the poor were drowned — the rich paid a fine into the king's treasury, for as our chronicle of St. Denis hath it, the king holds ' en horreur et abomination ces horribles sacremens que ces gloutons joueurs de des font souvent en ces cours, et ces tavernes.' " "But, dear mother, was he not right to punish such?" "To fine the rich, and drown the poor, Rosalie?" — Rosalie perceived that her shield was ineffectual, and her mother proceeded, but not till she had cautiously looked around her. "To fill up the measure of his obedience to sacerdotal pride and hatred, he published an edict renewing the persecution against the Paterins." — "The Paterins, mother?" Clotilde smiled faintly at her daughter's interrogatory. "The name of these much abused people you have not yet heard, for it is a perilous one to speak in our court; but they are the followers of those pious men who, having obeyed the commands of their Lord, and searched the Scriptures, have changed their faith and reformed their morals. They differ somewhat among themselves, having entered into the glorious liberty of the gospel, and being no longer bound to uniformity by the bulls of the Pope or the word of the Priest. They have all been marked by the purity of their lives — a few by their austerity. Some among them eat no meat, and others deem even marriage criminal." "Mother!" exclaimed Rosalie, in a tone that indicated a revelation had burst upon her. "I read your thoughts, Rosalie — yes — I am a Paterin. Here in the very bosom of the court I cherish the faith for which many that I loved were cast into prison, and afterwards 'made (I still quote from our Court Chronicle) to pass through material flames to the eternal flames which awaited them!'" "And was it such as you, my mother," asked Rosalie, pressing her cheek to Clotilde's, "that thus suffered?" "Such, and far better, Rosalie; and who," she added, the ecstasy of faith irradiating her fine countenance, "who would shrink from the brief material fire through which there is a sure passage to immediate and eternal glory?" If there are moments of presentiment when the future dawns upon the mind with all the vividness of actual presence, this was one to Rosalie. She threw her arms around her mother's neck and said in a trembling voice, "God guard my mother!" "He has guarded me," replied the lady Clotilde, gently unlocking Rosalie's arms, "and will while it is best that I continue like the prophet safe in a den of lions. 'Take no thought for the morrow,' Rosalie. — But I have been led far away from my main purpose, which was to give you a brief history of the lady Agnes." "Our lord the king had contracted a marriage with Isemburg of Denmark, daughter of Waldemar le Grand. On his progress to receive her, he visited the castle of one of the Duke of Meranie's adherents, where a tournament was holding. His rank was carefully concealed. He was announced in the lists as le Chevalier affiance, and his motto was la bonne 'esperance.' — Our lady Agnes — then in her sixteenth year — just your present age — presided as queen of love and beauty. Philip was thrice victorious, and thrice crowned by the lady Agnes. At the third time there were vehement demands that his visor should be removed. He appealed to Berchtold, the father of our lady, and prayed permission to preserve his incognito to all but the lady Agnes, to whom, if she were at tended by only one of her ladies, he would disclose his name and rank. Berchtold allowing that nought should be refused to the brave and all conquering knight, granted the private audience of his daughter, and she selected me from among her ladies to attend her. Philip, affianced to another, and confessing himself bound to keep the letter of his faith, violated its spirit. He declared himself passionately in love with our lady, and vowed eternal faith to her. — Our poor lady, smitten with love, received and returned his vows. The marriage with Isemburg was celebrated four days after." "Was he married to Isemburg?" "Yes, if that may be called marriage, Rosalie, which is a mere external rite — where there is no union of heart — where vows are made to be broken." "This surely is most sinful — but not so when hearts as well as hands are joined — think you, mother?" The lady Clotilde proceeded without a reply to her daughter's interrogatory. "It was told through Christendom that the king of France, on receiving the hand of the beautiful Isemburg, was seen to turn pale and tremble, and shrink from her; and when her rare beauty and her many graces were thought on, there was much marvelling, and many there were who attributed the strange demeanour of the king to sorcery! The lady Agnes and I alone knew the solution of the mystery. — Eighty days after the marriage he appealed for a divorce to bishops and archbishops assembled at Compeigne — his own servile tools. The marriage was annulled on a mere pretext, and immediately followed by the outward forms of marriage with our fair lady." "I comprehend not these matters; but, mother, were not the lawful forms observed?" "Rosalie! beware how in your tenderness for your mistress you confound right and wrong. Priests may not, at their pleasure, modify the law of God. The rules of holy writ are few and inflexible. — Isemburg denied the validity of the divorce, and retired to a convent. The Pope, from worldly policy, has maintained her part. An interdict was lain upon the kingdom. Marriages and interments in consecrated ground were forbidden. Weeping and mourning pervaded Philip's dominions — all for this guilty marriage. Then followed reconciliation with the Pope — then fresh animosities and perjuries — and through all Philip has adhered to our lady." "Faithful in that, at least, mother." "Yes, faithful where faith was not due. The lady Isemburg still lives and claims her rights— every true heart in Christendom is for her, and it is only here, in the court of Our Lady, that her wrongs are unknown, or never mentioned." "And why, my dear mother," asked Rosalie, recurring to her first feelings, "why, since you have so long kept this sad tale from me, why did you tell it now?" "I kept it because that, yet a child in years, it was not essential you should know it, and I could not bear to throw a shade over your innocent and all-trusting love for our lady. Now you are entering on the scene of action yourself. Temptation will assault you from which I cannot shield you. Even your mother, my child, cannot keep your account with your Judge." "Alas, no. — But what temptations have I to fear, dear mother?" "You are endowed with rare beauty, Rosalie, and in this court there will be many smooth tongues to tell you this." "They have already told me so," said the ingenuous Rosalie, slightly blushing. "Who? — who?" asked her mother. "The lord Thiebant, and the young knights Arnold and Beaumont, and the king himself; but indeed, mother, it moved me not half so much as when my lady Agnes commends the manner of my hair, or the fitting of my kerchief." "Ah, Rosalie, these flattering words have been as yet lightly spoken — as it were to a child, but when they are uttered in words of fire, par amour!" "Oh, if you fear for me, mother," said Rosalie, dropping on her knees, and crossing her arms in her mother's lap, "I will now vow myself to the Virgin." "Will you, Rosalie?" "In sooth I will. Not to immure myself within the walls of a convent, shut out from that communion which the Creator holds with his creatures through his visible works ; and that still better communion vouch safed to us when we are fellow-workers with Him in missions of mercy and love to His creatures." "You are somewhat of a Paterin too, my Rosalie," said her mother, rejoicing that her indirect lessons were so definitely impressed on her daughter's mind. "But have you comprehended the perfect spirituality of the Christian's law? Do you know there is no virtue in external obedience, however self-denying and self-afflicting that obedience may be, if the affections, the desires, the purposes, are not in perfect subjection to the will of God? Do you know that if you now vow yourself to a vestal's life, it would be sin should you hereafter, even in thought, repent this vow and sorrow for it." "But, dear mother that cannot be. I can never love another so well as I love you, and our poor lady Agnes. Now, therefore, in this quiet Temple of God let me make the vow." Clotilde's face was convulsed with thick coming conflicting thoughts and feelings. In common with many of her sect, she had retained that tenderest and most poetic feature of the Catholic religion, a tender homage for the Virgin. She believed the holy mother would vouchsafe supernatural aid to her vestal followers, and this aid she thought might be essential to one who, with unsuspecting youth, and surpassing beauty, was beset by the dangers of a court of which virtue was not the presiding genius. But on the other hand, she feared to take advantage of the inexperience of her child. Her very willingness to assume the shackles, made her mother shrink from their imposition. Rosalie clasped her hands and raised her eyes. "Stay, my sweet child — not now," said her mother, "a vow like this demands previous meditation, and much communing with your own spirit. I trust you are moved by heavenly inspiration, and if so, the work now begun will be perfected. In eight days from this we celebrate the marriage of St. Catharine, that marriage which typifies the sacred spiritual union of the perfected saint with the author of her salvation. I have twice dreamed the day had arrived, and marvellous, and spirit-stirring fancies, if they be fancies, have mingled with my dreams. I witnessed the holy marriage. I gazed at the sacred pair, when suddenly, as St. Catharine was receiving the bridal ring, it was you, my Rosalie, and not the saint; your face was as vivid as it is now to my actual sense, and instead of the pale slender hand of the saint, was your's — dimpled and rose tinted as it now is; but alas! the ring would not go upon your finger. While I marvelled and sorrowed, flames crackled around me; you, the celestial bridegroom, all vanished from my eyes, clouds of smoke rose around me, as I looked up for help, their dense volume collected over my head parted and I beheld a crown as bright as if it were of woven sun beams, a martyr's crown." "Dear mother! I like not this dream." "Be not disquieted, my child. Our dreams are sometimes heavenly inspirations, but oftener compounded of previous thoughts and impressions. Martyrdom has ere now been within the scope of my expectations, and that your marriage may be like that of the blessed St. Catharine, is my continual prayer. Look not back, but forward. If it please heaven to strengthen and confirm the good purpose now conceived, on St. Catharine's Eve you shall make your vow." "So be it, mother, yet I would it were now." The ladies were interrupted by a page from the queen who came to summon the lady Clotilde to his mistress' presence. Little Marie seeing her favourite at liberty left her attendant and insisted, with the vehemence of a petted princess as she was, that Rosalie should take a stroll with her along the bank of the river. Rosalie, scarcely past childhood herself, felt her spirits vibrate to the touch of her little friend, and they ran on sportively together, followed by the Moorish servant, till they came to the shore, where beneath a clump of trees, overgrown with flowering vines, a bench had been placed to afford a paste restante, which a painter might have selected, as affording, on one side a view of the turrets of the castle, towering above the paradise in which it was embosomed, and on the other, of the windings of the Seine and the picturesque bridge that crossed it. Just before Rosalie arrived at this point of sight, a cavalcade had passed the bridge on their way to the castle — the Archbishop of Rheims and his retinue. One of them had lagged behind the rest, and stopping on the bridge to survey the river, he had caught a glimpse of what seemed to him the most poetic personifications of youth and childhood that his eye had ever rested on. The spectator was mounted on a Spanish jennet, caparisoned with the rich decorations which the knights of the time, who regarded their steeds almost as brothers in arms, were wont to lavish on them. The bridle was garnished with silver bells, so musical that they seemed to keep time to the graceful motions of the animal. It might have puzzled an observer to decide to which of the two great faineant classes that then divided the Christian world, knights, or monks, to assign the rider. Beneath a long monastic mantle, fastened by a jewelled clasp, a linked mailed shirt might be perceived. The face of the wearer had the open gay expression of a preux chevalier, with a certain softness and tenderness that indicated a disposition rather to a reflective, that an active life. He had become wearied of the solemn and silent pomp of the archbishop's retinue, and had resigned the distinction of riding beside his highness for a gayer companion and a freer position in the rear of the train. "By my faith, Arnaud," said he, "I find these lords, bishops and archbishops very stupid, in propria persona." "Ah, Gervais, had you heeded me! but as the proverb says ' good counsel has no price.' " "But my good master priest, we have yet to see whether my hope will not give the lie to your experience." "Bravo!" retorted Arnaud, laughing louder than one would have dared to laugh nearer the archbishop. "St. Catharine's is the day you doff that mailed shirt of yours, forever? When that day comes round again, we shall see whether dame Experience has forfeited a name for speaking truth, and lying Hope has gained one." "Holy Mary!" exclaimed Gervais de Tilbery, checking his horse as he entered upon the stone bridge. "What hour is that!" "Softly, Sir Gervais," replied his friend," it is scarcely prudent to utter oaths, and gaze after houris within a bow-shot of my lord archbishop, — within seven days of St. Catharine's Eve! Are you spell bound, Gervais?" Gervais heeded not the prudent caution of his friend, but asking him to bid Hubert (his attendant) come to him, he permitted Arnaud to proceed alone. Hubert came. Gervais gave him the horse to lead to the castle. Hubert disappeared, and Gervais succeeded in scaling the bridge and letting himself down within the paradise that enclosed the houri, whom he approached (unseen by her) through a walk enclosed by tall flowering shrubs. As he issued from it, he perceived his magnet still standing near where he had first seen her, but now in a state of great alarm. The bench, mentioned above, had been taken from its supporters, and one end of it was projecting over the precipitous bank. An eddy in the river had worn away the bank beneath, and the water there was deep and rapid. Little Marie with the instinct which children seem to possess to find, or make danger, had run on to the bench, and when Rosalie stepped on to draw her back she darted forward to its extremity, beyond Rosalie's reach; she perceiving that if she advanced one inch farther the bench would lose its balance and they must both be precipitated into the river. The child perfectly unconscious of danger was diverted at Rosalie's terror, and clapping her hands and jumping up and down was screaming "Why don't you catch me, Rosalie?" The Moorish girl threw herself on her knees and supplicated the child to come back, in vain. Rosalie was pale and trembling with terror, when she felt a firm tread on the bench, behind her, and turning, saw the stranger, who said to her "fear not, sweet lady, give me your hand — I am twice your weight — the board will not move — now advance a step and grasp the little girl." This was done in an instant, and the mischievous little gypsey was dragged from her tormenting position. Rosalie after she had kissed and chidden her, bade her return with Zeba to the castle, saying she would instantly follow, and then turned to thank the stranger for his timely interposition. A bright flush succeeded her momentary paleness. It may be that the joy of transition from apprehension to security was enhanced by its being effected by a young and handsome stranger-knight, for the young ladies of the middle ages were as richly endowed with the elements of romance as the fair readers of our circulating libraries, who find in many a last new novel but little besides a new compound of the songs of troubadours, and tales of trouveurs. The thanks given, and most graciously received, Rosalie felt embarrassed by the stranger continuing to attend her. "Think me not discourteous, sir knight," said she, " if I apprise you that you are within the private pleasure grounds of our lady queen — sacred to herself and the ladies of her court." While Gervais paused for some pretext for lingering, Rosalie kindly added, " I know not how you came here, but I am sure you were heaven-directed." "Surely then, fair lady, I should follow Heaven's guidance, and not leave the celestial companion vouch safed me." "But," asked Rosalie, smiling, "is not thy mission accomplished?" "It would be profane in me to say so, while I am within superhuman influence." "Well," thought Rosalie, "since he persists, there is no harm in permitting him to go as far as the grapery — there we must separate." Some conversation followed, by which it appeared that the stranger was of the Archbishop of Rheims' household, and Rosalie asked him "if he knew aught of Gervais de Tilbery?" "Aye, lady," replied Gervais, "both good and evil." "Evil? I have heard nought but good of him." "What good can you have heard of one scarce worthy to be named before you?" "This must be sheer envy," thought Rosalie, but the thought was checked when, glancing her eye at the stranger's face she saw a sweet pleasurable smile there. "Many," she said," have brought us report of his knightly feats, and some, who note such matters, of his deeds of mercy. Our ladies call him the handsome knight, and the brave knight, and the knight of the spotless escutcheon." "Oh, believe them not — believe them not!" said Gervais, laughing. "Seeing is believing, saith the musty adage," replied Rosalie. "Gervais de Tilbery is coming to the Chateau des Roses with the Archbishop." "And is here, most beautiful lady!" cried Gervais, dropping on one knee, "to bless heaven for having granted him this sweet vision — to ask thy name — and to vow eternal fealty." "Oh, stop — rise, Sir," said Rosalie, utterly disconcerted and retreating from Gervais, "I am a stranger to thee." " Nay," said he, rising, and following her, " I care not for thy name, nor lineage — no rank could grace thee — do not, I beseech you, thus hasten from me — hear my vows." "You are hasty, Sir," said Rosalie, drawing up her little person with a dignity that awed Gervais;" and now I think of it — have I not heard that it was your purpose to enter the church?" Gervais became suddenly as grave as Rosalie could have wished. "It was my purpose," he replied, in a voice scarcely audible. "Then you are already bound by holy vows." "Not yet — the ceremony of the tonsure is appointed for the festival of St. Catharine." "St. Catharine!" Rosalie's exclamation was involuntary. Her own purposed vow recurred to her, and she may be pardoned if she (being sixteen) deemed the coincidence a startling one. They proceeded together: Gervais, in spite of her remonstrances, attending her through the grapery to the garden gate, where Marie stood awaiting her. "Come in, Rose — come in,"said the impatient child,"and you, sir stranger, go back — I hate you, and mama will hate you for stealing away my Rose." So saying, she shut the gate in poor Gervais's face, before he had time to speak, or even look a farewell to Rosalie. He had leisure, during his long, circuitous walk to the castle, to meditate on his adventure, to see bright visions of the future, and to decide, if necessary to sacrifice the course of ambition opened by the Archbishop's patronage to the attainment of Rosalie. Gervais de Tilbery was of noble birth; a richly endowed, gay, light-hearted youth, who was guided by his impulses; but, fortunately, they were the impulses of a nature that seemed, like a fine instrument, to have been ordained and fitted to good uses by its author. A word in apology of his sudden passion, and its immediate declaration: In that dark sera when woman was sought (for the most part) only for her beauty, a single view was enough to decide the choice; the wife was elected as suddenly as one would now pronounce on the beauty of a fabric or a statue. Gervais de Tilbery, for the first time in his life, felt that woman was a compound being, and that within the exquisite material frame, there dwelt a spirit that consecrated the temple. It was on the evening of the day following Rosalie's meeting with the young knight, that Clotilde was officiating at her daughter's toilette. She was preparing for a masked ball, where she was to appear as a nymph of Diana. She was dressed in a light green china silk robe, fitted with exquisite skill to a form so vigorous, graceful and agile, that it seemed made for sylvan sports. Her luxuriant hair was drawn, a la Grecque, into a knot of curls behind, and fastened by a small silver arrow. A silver whistle, suspended by a chain of the same material, richly wrought, hung from her girdle. Her delicate feet were buskined, her arms bare. She had a silver bow in her hand, and to her shoulder was attached a small quiver of the finest silver network, filled with arrows. After her mother had finished her office of tire-woman, which she would permit none to share with her, and before tying on Rosalie's mask, she gazed at her with a feeling of pride and irrepressible triumph. A sigh followed this natural swelling of her heart. "Why that sigh, dear mother?" asked Rosalie. "I sighed, my child, to think how little you appear in this heathen decoration, like a promised votary of the blessed Virgin." "Not promised," replied Rosalie hastily, and blushing deeply. "Not quite promised, my child, but meditated." "Mother," said Rosalie and paused, for the first time in her life hesitating to open her heart to her parent; but the good impulse prevailed, and she proceeded. "Mother, in truth the more I meditate on that, the less am I inclined to it." "Rosalie!" "So it is, dear mother; and is it not possible that you directed me to defer the vow in obedience to a heavenly intimation? — I have thought it might be so." Clotilde fixed her penetrating eye on Rosalie's. "There is something new in your mind, Rosalie; keep it not back from me, my child; be it weakness or sin, I shall sorrow with, not blame you." "It may be weakness, mother, but I am sure it is not sin. I told you of my meeting with Gervais de Tilbery, in la Vigne." "Yes, and of his rescuing our little Marie, but nought else." "There was not much else — and yet his words and looks, and not my vow to the Virgin, have been in my mind ever since." Rosalie, after a little stammering and blushing, gave her mother a faithful relation of every particular of the meeting, and though she most dreaded her mother's comments on that part of her story, she did not disguise that Gervais was destined for holy orders. Her mother embraced her, and thanked her for her confidence. "Dear child," she said, "forewarned, I trust you will be forearmed. This young Gervais 1 will see no barrier to his pursuit of you in the holy vows he assumes. The indulgence and absolutions of our corrupted church license all sin; but we are not thus taught of the Scriptures, whose spiritual essence has entered into hearts that we believe marriage, even performed with all holy ceremony and legal rites, is not permitted to the saint, albeit allowed to human infirmity." "I always believe what you say to me, mother; yet"- "Yet — speak freely, Rosalie." "Yet it does seem to me incomprehensible, that the relation should be wrong, from which proceeds the tie that binds you to me and me to you; which opens a fountain of love that in its course is always becoming sweeter and deeper — hark! the bell is sounding — I must hasten to the queen's saloon — tie on my mask, and be assured no mask shall ever hide a thought or feeling from you, my mother." How did the aspect and the spirit of the scene change to Rosalie, from the quiet apartment of her saintly mother, to the queen's saloon brilliantly illuminated, filled with the flower of French chivalry and with the court beauties, whom the lady Agnes, either from a real passion for what was loveliest in nature, or to show how far her conjugal security was above all envy, delighted to assemble about her in great numbers. She was seated at the king's right hand, under a canopy of crimson and gold. The king was in his royal robes and both he and the lady Agnes were without masks. She was dressed in the character of Ceres, and her rich and ripened beauty personified admirably the Queen of Summer. Her crown (an insignia which, probably from her contested right to it, she was careful never to omit,) was of diamonds and gold, formed into wheat-heads, the diamonds representing the berry, and the gold the stem and beard. Her robe was of the finest Flanders cloth, glittering with embroidery, depicting the most beautiful productions of the earth which, as her ample train followed her, seemed to spring up at her tread. The young Philip sat at his father's feet on an embroidered cushion, Marie at her mother's, both personifying Bacchantes. The ladies of the court, in the costume of nymphs, muses, and graces, were at the queen's right hand; the lords and knights, in various fantastical characters, at the king's left. It was suspected, from several persons wearing the symbols of a holy profession, that the Archbishop's party was present, but as he was precise in observances, and severe in discipline to cruelty, none ventured to assert it. Rosalie was met at the door by one of the appointed attendants, and led to the Lady Agnes' side, a station always assigned her as the favourite of her mistress. "Ah, my little nymph of the chase," said the queen, as Rosalie knelt at her feet and lay down her bow in token of homage, "you are a rebel tonight; what has Ceres to do with Diana's followers?" "True," said a young knight who had a pilgrim's staff in his hand," one is the bountiful mother, and the other the nun of mythology — more unkind than the nun, for she does not immure the charms which it is profanity to admire." "Gervais de Tilbery," thought Rosalie, instantly recognising his voice, "your words seem to me prophetic." "There is no false assumption in this character of yours," continued the pilgrim knight, "for the arrow loosed from thy bow is sure to pierce thy victim's heart." "Hush all!" cried the queen. "Our minstrel begins, and our ears would drink his strain, for his is the theme welcomest and dearest." Philip Augustus, as in some sort the founder of the feudal monarchy, has made an epoch in history. His reign seemed to his subjects to revive the glorious era of Charlemagne. It was the dawn of a brilliant day after a sleep of four centuries. He enlarged and consolidated his dominions. France, till his reign, had been divided into four kingdoms, of which that governed by the French king was the smallest. He made a new era in the arts and sciences. He founded colleges and erected edifices which are still the pride of France. Notre Dame was reconstructed and enlarged by him. He conveyed pure water by aqueducts to the city of Paris, and in his reign that city was first paved and redeemed from a pestilential condition. His cruelties, his intolerance, and his infidelities were the vices of his age. His beneficent acts were a just theme of praise, but that which made him an inspiring subject to his poet laureate minstrel was his passion for chivalric institutions, his love of the romances of chivalry, and the patronage with which he rewarded the inventive genius of the Trouveres. "In truth," says his historian, "it was during his reign that this brilliant creation of the imagination, (chivalry,) was in some sort complete." — The court minstrel, with such fertile themes, sung long, and concluded amidst a burst of applause. The dancing began, and again and again the pilgrim knight was seen dancing with Diana's nymph. “Ah, Gervais!" whispered a young man to him,” she of the silver-net quiver is I suspect your houri. A dangerous preparation this for your canonicals." “Why so, Arnaud? Do angels never minister to priests?" "Never, my friend, in such forms," replied Arnaud, laughing. "Then heaven forfend that I should be a priest!" A Dominican friar, in mask, approached Gervais, and said in a startling voice, "Thou art rash, young man — thou hast lain aside thy badge of sanctity," alluding to his pilgrim's staff. "What signifies it, good friar," replied Gervais, "if I part with the sign, so long as I retain the thing signified? I am not yet a priest." "Have a care, sir," replied the friar, in a tone that indicated he was deeply offended by Gervais's slur upon the priesthood, "speak not lightly of the office that hath a divine commission!" "And assumes divine power, good master friar!" The friar turned away, murmuring something of which Gervais heard only the words "edge tools." His mind was full of other matters, and they would have made no impression, had not his friend Arnaud whispered to him, as soon as the friar was again lost in the crowd, "Are you mad, Gervais? Knew you not the Archbishop?" "The Archbishop! — in that humble suit, how should I?" — "N'importe," added the gay youth, after a moment's panic, "the devil, as the proverb says, must hear truth if he listens. ”And the proverb tells us too, to 'bow to the bush we get shelter from.' " "My thanks to you, Arnaud. I have changed my mind, and shall not seek the bush's shelter. "Then beware! for that which might have afforded shelter, may distil poison." "Away with you and your croaking, Arnaud. This night is dedicated to perfect happiness, and you shall not mar it." "Alas, my friend! — the brightest day is often followed by the darkest night." But Gervais heard not this word of prophecy. The dance was finished, and he was leading off his beautiful partner. She permitted him to conduct her through the open suite of apartments, each one less brilliantly illuminated than the last, till they reached an apartment with a single lamp, and one casement window which opened upon a balcony that overlooked the garden. The transition was a delicious one from the heated and crowded apartments, to the stillness of nature, and the privity of moonlight — from the stifling atmosphere to the incense that rose from the unnumbered flowers of the garden beneath them. Rosalie involuntarily threw aside her mask, and disclosed a face, lit as it was by the sweet emotions and enthusiasm of the occasion, more beautiful than the memory and imagination of the enraptured lover had pictured it. It was a moment when love would broak no counsel from prudence; and Gervais, obeying his impulses, poured out his passion in a strain to which Rosalie, in a few, faintly spoken words, replied. The tone and the words sunk to the very depths of Gervais's heart, assuring him that he was beloved. An hour flew, while to the young lovers all the world but themselves seemed annihilated — then followed the recollection of certain relations and depen dencies of this mortal life. “My first care shall be," said Gervais, " to recede from this priesthood." “Thank kind heaven for that," replied Rosalie. "As they say in Provence, anything is better than a priest.'" The lovers both fancied they heard a rustling near them. They turned their heads, and Gervais stepped within the embrasure of the window. “It is nothing — we are unobserved," he said, returning to Rosalie's side. "But tell me, my Rosalie, (my Rosalie!) where heard you this Provence scandal?" “From my dear mother, who spent her youth at the court of the good Raymond." "St. Denis aid us! I believed Treres, Gui, and Regnier had plucked up heresy by the roots in Languedoc. Heaven forbid that she be infected with heresy!" "I know not what you call heresy, Sir Gervais de Tilbery, but my dear mother drinks at the fountain of truth, the Scriptures, and receives not her faith from man, be he called bishop, archbishop, or pope." "By all the saints, I believe she has reason in that. But, dear Rosalie, we will eschew heresy — it is a thorny road to heaven, and we will keep the safe path our fathers have trodden before us, in which there are guides who relieve us of all the trouble of self-direction — will we not?" "My mother is my guide, Sir Gervais." "So be it, my lovely Rosalie, till her guidance is transferred to me — and thereafter you will be faithful to God, St. Peter, and the Romish Church? And when shall your orthodoxy begin — on St. Catharine's Eve?" “I know not — I know not. All these matters must be referred to my dear mother and the queen. Rise, Sir Gervais, (her lover had knelt to urge his suit) — we linger too long here." Again there was a sound near them, and Gervais sprang forward to ascertain whence it proceeded — Rosalie followed him, and they both perceived the figure of the friar crossing the threshhold of the next apartment. "Could he have been here?" exclaimed Gervais — "he might have been hidden behind the folds of this curtain — but would he?" Gervais paused, — "Whom do you mean?" “The friar," answered Gervais, warily, for he feared to alarm Rosalie by the intimation of the possibility that the Archbishop of Rheims had overheard their conversation. Rosalie did not sleep that night till she had confided all, without the reservation of a single particular, to her mother. The lady Clotilde grieved that she must resign her cherished, dearest hope of seeing Rosalie self-devoted to a vestal's life, but true to her spiritual faith, that all virtue and all religion were in the mind, and of the mind, she would not persuade — she would not influence Rosalie to an external piety. She saw much advantage would result to Rosalie from an alliance with Gervais. It would remove her at once and forever from the contagion of the court atmosphere — from Lady Agnes's influence, so intoxicating to a young and confiding nature. Gervais was of noble rank and fortune, and when that distinction was almost singular among the young nobles of France, he was distinguished for pure morals. "It is possible," thought Clotilde, as she revolved in her mind all the good she had heard of him, "that the renovating Spirit of Truth has already entered his heart. It has not pleased heaven to grant my prayer, but next best to what I vainly asked, is this union of pure and loving hearts." The ingenuous disclosure Rosalie had made, awakened in her mind a vivid recollection of a similar experience of her youth, and produced a sympathetic feeling that perhaps, more than her reason, governed her decision. Rosalie that night fell asleep on her mother's bosom with the sweet assurance that her love was authorized. The next was a busy, an important, and a happy day to the lovers. “Time trod on flowers." Alas, the periods of perfect happiness are brief, and one might say with the fated Moor — "If it were now to die 'Twere now to be most happy; for I fear My soul hath her content so absolute, That not another comfort like to this Succeeds in unknown fate." Everything seemed to go well and as it should. The Archbishop, with a gloomy brow, but without one comment or hesitating word, acquiesced in Gervais's relinquishing his purpose of entering the church. The lady Agnes, loath to part with her favourite, yet graciously gave her consent, and persuaded the king to endow the young bride richly, and even the little Marie, though she at first stoutly and with showers of tears, refused to give up her own Rose, yet was at last brought over to the party of the lovers, by the promise of officiating as bridesmaid on St. Catharine's Eve. Would that we could end our tale here; but the tragic truth which darkens the page of history must not be suppressed. The Archbishop of Rheims was devoted to the aggrandizement of his own order — to extending and securing the dominion of the priesthood. His faith might be called sincere, but we should hardly excuse that man who, having been born and educated in a dark room, should spend his whole life in counteracting the efforts of others to communicate the light of heaven to him, and in stopping the little crevices by which it might enter. He was ready to grant any indulgence to errors, or even vices, that did not interfere with the supremacy of the church. He was the uncle of Philip, and, contrary to his inclination, he had been induced by that powerful monarch to countenance him in his rejection of the queen Isemburg, and had thereby involved himself in an unwilling contest with Innocent III. This pontiff, whose genius, his historian says, “embraced and governed the world," was equally incapable of compromise and pity. He had a few years antecedent to the events we have related, proclaimed the first crusade against the Albigeois, and had invested the dignitaries of the church throughout Christendom with the power "to burn the chiefs (of the new opinions) to disperse their followers, and to confiscate the property of all that did not think as he did. All exercise of the faculty of thinking in religious matters was forbidden." The Archbishop of Ilheims was eager to wipe out his offences against the head of the church by his zealous cooperation with him in this persecution. As has been seen, he was nettled by Gervais's contemptuous hit at the priesthood. It was an indication that the disease of heresy had touched even the healthiest members of the spiritual body, as the general prevalence of corresponding symptoms announced the approach of a wide wasting epidemic. He became restless and uneasy, and, in wandering alone through the apartments of the chateau, he had found his way to the window of the balcony occupied by our lovers, just in time to hear poor Rosalie's betrayal of her mother. He devoted the following day to a secret inquisition into the life and conversation of Clotilde. He found that she had long ceased to be a favourite of the lady Agnes, who tolerated her only on account of her daughter, and who felt somewhat the same aversion to her (and for analogous reasons) that Herodias cherished against John the Baptist. This feeling of the lady Agnes was rather discerned by the acute prelate than expressed by her, for there was not a fault of which she could accuse the pure and devout woman. Her offences were the rigid practice of every moral virtue. Her time and her fine faculties were all devoted to the benefit of her fellow creatures, so that she fell under the common condemnation, as set forth by a contem porary writer. "L'espritde mensonge, par la seule apparence d'une vie nette, et sans tache, soustrayoit ces inprudcns a la verite. Besides this, she was found deficient in the observance of the Romish ritual, and she ate no meat. This last sin of omission, being in accordance with the practice of 'the strictest among those early reformers, was an almost infallible sign of heresy; and on the day following the arrangements for Rosalie's marriage, the lady Clotilde was summoned before the Archbishop and a council of priests. Her guilt was assumed, and she was questioned upon the several points of the prevailing heresy. We cannot go into details. Our story has already swelled beyond due bounds. The lady Clotilde, unsupported and alone, answered all the questions of her inquisitors, with a directness, simplicity, a comprehension of the subject, and a modesty, that, as a cotemporary chronicler confesses, astounded all who heard her. But it availed nought. She was convicted of denying the right of the Romish church to grant indulgences and absolution, and, in short, of wholly rejecting its authority. The Archbishop condemned her as deserving the penalty of death, and the pains of everlasting fire, but he offered her pardon upon a full recantation of her errors. "I fear not him who only can kill the body," she replied, with blended firmness and gentleness, "but Him who can destroy both soul and body, and to Him," she added, raising her eyes and folding her hands, "I commend that spirit to which it hath pleased Him to vouchsafe the glorious liberty of the gospel." Her celestial calmness awed her judges — even the Archbishop hesitated for a moment to pronounce her doom, when a noise and altercation with the guard was heard at the door. It opened, and Rosalie rushed in, threw herself into her mother's arms, and all natural timidity, all fear of the tribunal before which she stood, merged in one overwhelming apprehension, she demanded, "what they were doing, and why her mother was there?" “Peace, rash child!" answered the Archbishop. "Shame on thy intrusion — know that thy mother is a convicted heretic." "What wrong has she ever done? Who has dared to accuse my mother?" cried Rosalie, still clinging to Clotilde, who in vain tried to hush and calm her. "Who was her accuser?" retorted the Archbishop, with a cruel sneer — "dost thou remember, foolish girl, who revealed the source of the Provence scandal?" The recollection of the sound she had heard during her fatal conversation with Gervais in the balcony, at once flashed upon Rosalie. She elevated her person, and, stretching out her arm towards the Archbishop, exclaimed, with ineffable indignation, "Thou wert the listener?" For an instant his cheeks and lips were blanched with shame, and then stifling this honest rebuke of conscience, he quoted the famous axiom of Innocent III. — "Dost thou not know, girl that 'it is to be deficient in faith, to keep faith with those that have no faith?' — Stand back, and hear the doom of all those who renounce the Romish church." "Pronounce the doom, then, on me too!" cried Rosalie, kneeling and clasping her hands. "I too renounce it — I hate it — I deny all my mother denies — I believe all she believes." "Mother, I do! — have you not taught me? — have we not prayed and wept together over the holy gospels, so corrupted and perverted by the priesthood?" "Enough!" said the Archbishop — "be assured we will not cut down the dry tree, and leave the green one to flourish." "Thanks! — then we shall die together," said Rosalie, locking her arms around her mother's neck. The delirious excitement had exhausted her — her head fell on her mother's bosom, and she was an unconscious burden in her arms. Clotilde laid her on a cushion at her feet, and knelt by her while the Archbishop, after a few words of consultation, doomed the mother and daughter "to pass through material to immaterial flames," on St. Catharine's day. They were together conveyed to a dungeon appertaining to the chateau. St. Catharine's Eve arrived. The houri that had been destined for Rosalie's bridals found her in a dungeon, seated at her mother's feet, her head resting on her mother's breast, and her eyes fixed on her face, while Clotilde read by the light of their lamp the fourteenth chapter of St. John. She closed the book. The calmness that she had maintained till then forsook her. She laid her face to Rosalie's, and the tears from her cheeks dropped on her child's. "Oh!" she ex claimed, nature subduing the firmness of the martyr, "it is in vain! I read, and pray, and meditate, but still my "heart is troubled" — the spirit is not willing." "Dear mother!" cried Rosalie, feeling as if the columns against which she leaned were tottering. "My child, it is not for myself I fear or feel. My mission on earth is finished — and I have an humble, but assured hope, that my Saviour will accept that which I have done in his service. For me death has no terrors. I should rejoice in the flames that would consume this earthly tabernacle and set my spirit free; but oh, my child!" She closed her eyes as if she would exclude the dreadful vision, "when I think of thy sweet body devoured by elemental fire my heart fails. I am tempted, sorely tempted. I fear that in that hour I shall deny the faith, and give up heaven for your life." "Mother, mother, do not say so. I hoped it was only I had sinful thoughts, and affections binding me to earth." The weakness of nature for a moment triumphed over the sublime power of religion, and the mother and child wept, and sobbed violently. So absorbed were they in their emotions that they did not hear the turning of the bolts of their prison, nor were they conscious of any one's approach till Rosalie's name was pronounced in a low voice; when they both started and saw, standing before them, Gervais de Tilbery, the lady Agnes and her confessor. Gervais threw himself on his knees before Rosalie, took her hand and pressed it to his lips. She returned the pressure, but spoke not. "There is no time to be lost, my dear friends," said the lady Agnes. "Clotilde," she continued, "I have vainly begged the boon of your life — it is denied me — but your child's — yours — my own dear Rosalie, I can preserve. It boots not now to say by what means I shall effect it." "Can she live," cried Clotilde vehemently, "without renouncing her faith? without denying her Lord?" "Without any condition but that she now give her hand to Gervais de Tilbery — the priest is ready." "Oh tempt me not! tempt me not," exclaimed Rosalie, throwing herself on her mother's bosom. "I will not leave her. I will die with her." "Hear me, my child," said her mother in a voice so firm, sweet, and tranquillizing that it spoke peace to the storm in Rosalie's bosom. "Hear me. I have already told you that for myself this dispensation has no terror, but my spirit shrinks from your enduring it — spare me, my child. God has condescended to my weakness and opened for you a way of escape — do you still hesitate? On my knees, Rosalie, I beg you to live — not for Gervais — not for yourself — for me — for your mother — give me your hand." Rosalie gave it. Now God bless thee my child — shield thee from temptation and deliver thee from evil! She put Rosalie's hand into Gervais's, and bidding the priest do his office, she supported her child on one side while Gervais sustained her on the other. Rosalie looked more like a bride for heaven than earth, her face as pale as the pure white she wore, and her lips faintly, and inaudibly, repeating the marriage vows. As the ceremony proceeded, her mother whispered again, and again, "courage my child! courage! It is for my sake, Rosalie." The priest pronounced the benediction. Rosalie had lost all consciousness. Her mother folded her in one fond, long protracted embrace, and then, without one word, resigned her to Gervais. The lady Agnes signed to the priest. A female attendant appeared. Rosalie was enveloped in a travelling cloak and hood and conveyed out of the prison. Clotilde remained alone. We may say, without presumption that angels came and ministered to her. We have only to add the conclusion of the cotemporary record. "One of the condemned escaped from punishment, and it is maintained that she was carried off by the devil; the other without shedding a tear or uttering a complaint submitted to death with a courage that equalled her modesty." Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource "St. Catharine's Eve" Subject The topic of the resource Religion, Faith and Sacrifice Description An account of the resource A loving mother tells her daughter the truth about her own religious beliefs which are later used to condemn both mother and daughter to death. The mother sacrifices herself to save the life of her daughter. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sedgwick, Catharine M. Miss Sedgwick Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Token (Boston) pp. 7-36 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Gray and Bowen Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1834 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource J. Robinson Relation A related resource Also collected in: Tales and Sketches, series one (Philadelphia, 1835), pp. 205-235. Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Document God heaven infidelity John the Baptist morals Orthodox Church pious priest tears Temptation The Token Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1829 Subject The topic of the resource Stories published in 1829. Document A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text. Text Any textual data included in the document. In the January number of the Miscellany, we promised to show how far little Mary Smith merited her royal title. We did not mean to imply that Queens were better—they are often not half as good as their subjects; but as no one is born to a title in our Republican country, it is supposed to be a badge of merit. We left Mary's father on the eve of sailing for Europe. About a year after his departure, Mrs. Smith, who was living in her economical cottage in Brookline, received a visit from Mrs. Gray, a lady who had been her neighbor in Boston, and who had a beautiful country seat in Brookline. She brought with her, her daughter Helen, a girl about a year older than Mary. She was dressed very beautifully in a French Frock, sent to her, with many other presents, by her aunt, who resided in Paris. Mary Smith was a very polite little girl—she had true politeness; the only politeness of any value. She attended to others from a real desire to make them happy. While her mother was talking with Mrs. Gray, she asked Helen if she would like to go out and see the pigeons . "No I thank you," said Helen. "Perhaps you do not like pigeons," said Mary modestly; "will you go and see ray Bantam chickens? They are perfectly white and the cunningest things you ever saw. Will you go?" "No I thank you." "What is Miss Mary saying to you?" asked Helen's mother. Helen ran to her and whispered loud enough to be heard, "She wants me to go out and see her pigeons; and I am afraid that I shall soil my frock and not be fit for the party." "Oh, go my dear," said her mother, "if Miss Mary wishes it." Helen went; but not in a humour to be pleased with any thing. -As they went out, Mary took a basket from a shelf on the piazza, and when they were in the yard she said, "Now Helen, I will show you something;" and she took a handful of oats from her basket and strewed them on the ground, and whistled for her pigeons. They came from all points of the compass; from the roof of the house and the eves of the barn. As they descended, their beautiful throats glittered in the sun; and as they lighted they folded their wings to their graceful bodies. "Oh are they not sweet creatures?" exclaimed Mary. "Why, they are nothing but common pigeons; are they?" said Helen. “I suppose they are called common pigeons," replied Mary. "Then, my dear child, you can't expect we to admire them; we have so many kinds of uncommon ones." "But do yours come like these, when you call them 1—Our Nancy says I put her in mind of Eve in Paradise calling down her birds." "I wish Nancy could see ours once; to be sure they don't come down like yours, because papa keeps them confined, for fear we shall lose them. Some of them are beautiful ring-doves, and one kind we call blood pigeons, because they have a bright red stain on their white bosoms, and look as if they had just had a knife plunged into them." "They must be very curious," said Mary. "I wish I had some like them." "Oh my dear child," replied Helen, "I don't think it is very probable you can get them. Papa sent a great way for ours, and he says they cost quite a sum of money; but come Mary, if you have any thing more to show, you must make haste, for I would not be late at Anne Rush's for any thing. It is her birth day; and we expect a most elegant time." Mary turned away from her pigeons without giving them her usual parting look of admiration, and passed by the coop where her bantam chickens were, without pointing them out to Helen. She did not know exactly why, but she did not want to show them, after what Helen had said about the pigeons. "Would you like to see my little garden, Helen?" she asked. "Yes—if you will make haste." Mary led the way to the gate as quick as she could, and as soon as they entered, Helen laughed and said, " Why, what a little bit of a place." "It is quite big enough for mother and I, and little Ben Lacy to take care of," said Mary, in a tone of slight displeasure: for she could not bear to have her garden, which was her pride and her delight, spoken of with contempt. "You need not be angry Mary," said Helen; "come let us see what is in your garden." "You do see, Helen, almost all I have—asters, and mary-golds, and cockscombs, and this pretty crimson dalia." "Are these all?" asked Helen, scarcely looking at them. "Almost all I have now; you know Helen, it is the fall of the year—and we cannot have such a very great variety of autumnal flowers; mother says so." " Oh my dear child, you are very much mistaken—our green house is full of flowers now ; geraniums, and myrtles, and jessamines, and heliotropes, and three kinds of passion flowers, one perfumed—of course, you know, seeing so many at home, I cannot think much of these, which one sees in every garden patch by the road side. Oh, this cockscomb is decent!"—and she pulled off a very fine one; the finest in the garden. Mary's heart beat hard when she saw Helen snap off the stalk: but she did not speak. "I have nothing more to show you, Helen," she said, "but one tube-rose," and she turned round a high seringa bush, on the other side of which was the tube-rose. "Oh yes," exclaimed Helen, “here is something really worth showing;" and as she said this, she plucked, without the slightest hesitation, from a fine grape vine, its only bunch of grapes. Mary jumped up as if she had been shot; then walked away; and then as suddenly returned. She tried hard to help it, but in spite of her efforts the tears were running down her cheeks. "Do pray take your grapes, Miss Mary," said Helen, bridling up.—" I had no idea a bunch of grapes was such a mighty affair—how should I, when we have bushels and bushels in our grapery." "It is not for the grapes I care," said Mary, "but"— "But what, child?" "I had rather not tell you, if you please, Helen," replied Mary with a dignity that would have become a true Queen; "but I hope you will excuse my appearing rude to you." Helen at this moment perceived that in her haste to devour the grapes, she had permitted the juice to run down on her precious frock. She was vexed with herself, and vexed with Mary; and she threw down the grapes, and trampled on them. She was relieved from her awkward and disgraceful position by a call from the coachman, who told her that her mother was already in the carriage awaiting her. She ran off without bidding Mary good by. Mary did not follow her; she stood bending over her grapes till she heard another carriage drive up to the door, and saw her aunt Ray, and her cousins, Julia and Mary, alight from it. The girls ran to her, and embraced her most affectionately. "Come back in the garden with us, Mary," they both said in a breath, and both exclaimed, as they entered, "How sweet pretty your flowers look! Oh Mary, mother is in such a hurry, we must tell you right off what we came for. Mother wants you to come and live with us this winter, and go to dancing-school with us. Oh how delightful it will be! We are to have cotillion parties ; and father says he will take us all to the theatre to see Aladdin, and we are all to spend Thanksgiving at uncle Henry's— but what is the matter, Mary? You do not seem at all pleased." "Because you know, girls, I cannot go and leave mother." "Ah, but that is the best of it—your mother is going too—mamma has come to persuade her." "Oh that will be delightful," said Mary; and she forgot her grapes and her cockscomb, and every trouble on earth, and ran with her cousins to the house. There they found their mothers so earnestly engaged in conversation, that they did not venture to interrupt them, but returned to the garden, and staid merrily talking till the girls went away. Their last parting words were, "We shall soon be together, and for the whole winter." As the carriage drove away, Mary sprang up the door steps—ran into the parlor, and jumping into her mother's lap, she threw her arms around her neck, exclaiming, “Oh, how glad I am we are going to stay at Aunt Ray's." "We are not going there, my dear Mary." "Not going mother?" exclaimed Mary with a look and tone of dismay—"did not aunt Ray ask us?” "Yes, she did ask us very kindly." "And you are not going; and all the dismal winter I must stay here, where there is nothing pleasant." "Nothing pleasant! my child, you forget your garden." "In winter, mother, that is nothing; and beside, Helen Gray does not think it is pretty at all, now. "And your Bantams, Mary, and your pet pigeons—have you forgotten them?" "Why, they are nothing but common pigeons, mother; Helen says so. But why don't you go to aunt Ray's." "I have good reasons my child, for not going; but you could not perfectly understand them if I were to tell them. You are a little unreasonable just now; but I trust you will soon be as happy as ever." "No, mother—no! I never shall be happy again here. Julia and Mary are going to have pleasures all winter; and Helen Gray is living away in all her grandeur. Oh, I wish we were rich again, and had our carriage, and could ride away from this desert place." Mrs. Smith was distressed at seeing Mary, usually as happy as a lamb frisking on the grass, so discontented and repining. "My dear child," she said,” I am mortified to hear you express such wrong feelings and foolish wishes; and you really think riches would make us happier than we are?” "I am sure of it; for then we should not have to live in the country." "You said yesterday, Mary, you could live any where with me." Mary coloured a little, but quickly replied, "So I could, mother; but that does not make it out that it is not far pleasanter to live in one place than another." Mary saw her mother looked very grave; and she thought of another reason, which she felt very sure her mother could not answer. "If we were rich, mother, we should have something to give away; but now, what good can we do?" Mrs. Smith did not reply to her question, but she said, “Mary, something has curdled your sweet disposition to-day. Your head is full of wrong thoughts and false notions. But every body has them, old and young. Some are cured in one way, some in another; and some are never cured at all. I will not talk any more with you now. Get your hat, and we'll take a walk." The result of this walk will be seen from Mary's letter to her brother. "To his Majesty, King William; or what is far better, to my own dear brother, Will." "I have a great deal to say to you, and cannot wait till you get home, though it will be so soon. Soon mother calls it; but to me it seems a great while. "I have counted the time every way, and ciphered it into hours, minutes and seconds, but I can't shorten it—21 days, 504 hours, 30240 minutes, 1814400 seconds. Only think what a horrible number of seconds! Mother tells me that some great man says, 'an hour may be tedious; but cannot be long.' 1 guess if he had spent an hour waiting for his only darling brother, it would have seemed both tedious and long too. But then we can't expect great folks can know how little ones feel. "Now, William, as we agreed to tell one another every thing that happened, I am going to tell you how badly I behaved the other day; and the good way mother took to drive away all my cross, wrong feelings. Don't you wonder if there are any real children that talk so wise and so good, and always do just the right thing, if it be ever so difficult, as children do in books ? I guess there are no such children in the world; though they really seem alive in some of the books I have read. How I do run on without coming to my story; but some how or other, when I am writing to you, William, I think of so much to say, that I wish I had a pen that would write two lines at once—something like an old woman's tongue, I have heard of, that was fastened in the middle and talked at both ends. But to begin with my story. A certain young lady came here yesterday, I will only write her initials—H. G. She was dressed as fine as a toy shop doll. Mother says Mrs. Grey is almost the only mother in Boston that dresses her children fine. I think it is very silly of her. I will tell you one thing, William, that I have found out—and that is, that there are several grown up people very silly. Well, I wished to please H. and I offered to show her whatever we had that was pretty. In the first place, I called the pigeons; they never looked more beautiful—the sun shone on their necks and they glittered, and looked as if they had been dipped in a rainbow; but Miss H. did not admire them in the least; but tried to make me sick of them. I did not show her my little Bantams, for I knew she would scorn them too; but I led her to the garden, for I thought she could not possibly help admiring that. But no—my lady walked straight along the alley, as if she had neither nose nor eyes, though the flowers were on each side like a rich fringe—till she came near to my most beautiful cockscomb. It was the one you sowed the seeds of, the very last thing you did before you went away, after we carried your trunk to the gate, and while you was waiting for the stagecoach—you remember it. As we were both stooping over the flower bed, you dropped a tear on it. I thought of what Mr. Brown said in his sermon,' that tears often produced good fruits,' and if they did fruits, I did not see why they should not flowers ; so I took particular care of this one cockscomb, and watered it, and grubbed about it every day ; and to be sure it was the most superb one I ever saw— twice, yes, five times as big as our rooster's, that was frozen last winter.* By the way, I have made the funniest little fur-cap for my bantam cockscomb against next winter. Well, Miss H. marched up to this cockscomb, and snapped it off, as if it had been any common thing. I liked to have screamed out; but I kept my lips fast together, and we turned round the seringa and came full in view of my grape vine. Now you know this is my pet and darling, above every thing else. I never look at it without thinking how kind it was of Mr. Perkins to give us such a valuable vine, three years old! And what a tug you had of it bringing it home with all the soil about it; and how you taught me to take care of it, and told me Mr. Perkins said girls and ladies might take the whole care of grape vines, if they would. I never let any body touch it but myself. Every day I bid it good morning with my little trowel, and good night with my watering-pot; *and I have tied it up, and taken out all the false wood. It put out four bunches in the spring; but they all died away but one, and that was a grand one. I looked at it twenty times a day: it grew larger and larger, and the grapes seemed almost crowding one another off the stem, and they had turned purple, and were darker and brighter every day, and mother, and I, and Ben Lacy, all thought they would be just perfectly ripe when you came home. How do you think I felt then, William, when Helen Grey—I must write her name full out this time—jumped forward, and before I could speak, tore off the stem, and began to devour the grapes? I cried, I must own it. I could not possibly help it; and then she was affronted, and threw them down, and trod on them. As I told mother, it was a dreadful sight to see my beautiful grapes all covered with dirt, and trampled on! Mother says, after all, it is one of the lesser miseries of life. If that is the case, don't you hope we shall never have any of the greater, William 1 "As good luck would have it, H.'s mother called her, and they went away; and in their place came our dear Aunt, and Julia and Mary? as rich as Miss H.; but oh how different!— Aunt came to ask mother and I to pass the winter with her, but mother did not consent; and I was so disappointed, and had been so plagued with Helen, that I was cross as a cat, or, as mother says, unreasonable. I fretted about living at Brookline, and about being poor ; and what is worse, William—I will tell you all, for that is the bargain—I tried to excuse myself by turning it off upon our having so little to give away. Now that was not what made me feel so bad— it was not the real truth—and that was what mother cared most about; for you know she hates above all things to have us pretend to be better than we are. However, she did not scold me—that she never does—she did not talk to me either, then; but asked me to go and walk with her. We went down the green lane. It was just at evening, and you know ‘how sweet the hedge smells then—and there was an uncommon number of birds, and especially one bob o'lincoln, singing deliciously, what mother calls their evening hymn; but I don't think it sounds at all like a hymn. I began to think to myself that the country was a pretty decent place after all. Pretty soon we came in sight of Mrs. Warner's house. I must stop and tell you a little about her. She is a very poor woman; but not so very, very poor as some others, because she has a house, and a little land and a cow. Her husband died last spring, and left her with five children and his old bed-ridden mother to take care of. I said five, but I forgot the one in New York, who, she has lately heard, has the consumption. He is a very good young man, and used to help his mother a great deal; but now he has not even money enough to get home. As soon as mother turned towards the house—" There," said I, " if we were only as rich as we used to be, you could have brought Mrs. Warner money enough to send for her son." “Yes, Mary," she said,” but if we do all we can for the poor, we shall not so much regret what we cannot do. I spoke to Mrs. Grey about poor Mrs. Warner— she gives away a great deal of money, and I do not doubt she has stopped and left her something." By this time we got to the house and went in. Mrs. Warner did not appear at all, as she usually does: instead of stepping about quick, and smiling, and speaking pleasantly, she just bowed her head, and after she had set out the chairs for us, she went into the other room; to wipe the tears out of her eyes, I rather think, by their looks when she came back. Old Mrs. Warner, her mother in law, seemed really cross for the first time in her life, though when mother asked her how she was, she answered just the same she always does. 'Thank 'e, ma'am, little better than I was yesterday; but not quite so well as the day before.' I took up the baby and began to play with it; and then the old woman began to talk. You must know William, she is a queer old woman: she talks in such an old fashioned way, and never stops; and her teeth are all gone, and her nose and chin almost meet, and her head shakes all the time. But I will give you a specimen: I shan't put any commas and periods to the sentences, because she has neither pauses nor stops. 'I hope Miss Smith,' she began, ' you and Mary wont surmise we ant glad to see you because we seem so frusticated (frustered) I am sure you are both as pleasant to our sight as light to the eyes; butmy darter and I are as it were upset by a visit from Miss Grey and her gal an airy little piece she is (mother says she meant full of airs) she walked into the room here as if she had been coming into a kanel (kennel) and stood in the middle of the floor and held up her frock as if she were in a muddy road, to be sure Miss Warner had just been mopping and when the baby went up to look at her fine bag she cried out ' hands off hands off and when poor Jemmy come in all covered with mud from being knocked down by a big dog in the road her mother there that Miss Grey gave him ninepence and told him to buy some water to wash his face— Jemmy took the ninepence and chucked it out of the window and if it had been a goold guinea much as we want money I would have been glad to see him do the same when his mother was reflected on for occrdoingness is Miss Warner's besetment—(mother says that she meant that her daughter was too nice) and Ma'am knows the house and the children are always kept like silver—and I too—the Lord reward her—a poor bedridden old soul as I am and not her own mother—I hope ma'am wont be affronted for when I boil over I cant help the words coming out—Miss Grey may be ma'ams friend as she called herself but they are as different as black and white—she gave us money to be sure but that was nothing but an aggravation—she asked me if I had been confined to my bed long, and I told her ten years and I was nothing but an atomy (an anatomy) and I was going to show her my arm— and she said ' keep it under the blanket good woman it makes me sick at my stomach—many is the time ma'am has looked at it and rubbed it too with her soft hand, and I guess her stomach is full as weak as Miss Grey's ; but I can tell her her difficulty lies in her heart and not in her stomach—sick at her stomach indeed ! what does she expect to do when its the Lord's pleasure to send sickness to her and hers—and when I told her I had terrible turns of lethercdge (lethargy) her gal laughed out— but the crowner of all was she came up to the bed and said ' Goody do stop talking one minute, and let me see if your nose and chin really meet'—Does ma'am think money could pay for such insults? To be sure she gave my darter ten dollars and she wants it bad enough to getjpoor John home—but its the hardest piece of humiliation we ever experienced yet to take it from her—I tell you what it is Mary Smith that does ithe poor most good—a kind word kindly spoken—when your mother comes here and sits down by my bed and convarses with me about my difficulties and talks to my darter and the young ones jist like a book only more understandingly (intelligibly) and when you come down and read to me you read full equal to a church minister—and teach Jemmy and Sally their hymns and writing—that's what feels good to us—it seems as if you thought we had the same natur and I guess that is what Miss Grey never thought of—and if she were to make me a present of the bank of England I should not feel thankful for it." "I have given you a pretty large sample of the poor woman's talk, but I had no idea how much paper it would fill. The hardest hearted thing of all was, Mrs. Grey's telling Mrs. Warner she ought to send her mother to the alms-house; and when Mrs. Warner told her she did not feel as if she could ever do that—' oh' says she, ' when poverty comes into the door, you should let your feelings fly up the chimney !' Mrs. Warner said, ' my feelings are my greatest comfort ma'am.' Mother says she believes this is true; for there was never any body who had better feelings. “My letter is so very long I am afraid you will be tired; and I will only just tell you what mother said coming home, because I think it will do me good and may do you good too. I wish I could put mother's sweet voice into my letter; but you will remember well enough how it sounds. " My dear child,' she said, ' old Mrs. Warner has answered the question you asked me before we came out: ' Mother, what good can we do, when we have nothing to give away?' It would be a grief indeed, Mary, if in losing our fortune we had lost the power of doing good. But you see there are charities the poor value more than the gift of money. In all our intercourse with the poor we should never forget they have, as old Mrs. Warner said, the same nature we have; the same faculties and affections; that the accidents of life, far more than our own merits, have placed them in one station, and us in another: that though they may have uncultivated minds in awkward bodies, yet those minds are immortal, like our own; those bodies, like ours, destined to suffer and perish. That the only difference our Creator and Judge will mark between us, will be the degrees of goodness; and when you think of Mrs. Grey, seeking her own pleasure, frivolous and selfish; and Mrs. Warner, humble and patient, and devoting her life to others, you will perceive the justice of the reverse in another world, of the condition in this. 'The high shall be cast down and the humble exalted.' Sympathy, Mary, is the key that unlocks all hearts. By sympathy I mean the feeling you have when you dismiss all thoughts of yourself, and enter into the feelings of another. It is my sympathy and yours, with this poor family that has won their hearts. I listen to all the old woman's tedious complaints. I enter into her daughter's sorrows and apprehensions and disappointments: and you my dear child, are patient in instructing the children: you show that you have their improvement at heart, because no weather keeps you at home, when the time comes for giving them their lessons. You do not carry them money; but you seldom So without a little basket of strawberries, or of some other fruit, or a bunch of flowers; and they see you take pleasure in their pleasure. 'Now Mary' you know it is not my habit to praise ourselves—I think it far better to go to others for examples of virtue when I am instructing you : but now I thought the best way to tell you what ' good we can do,' was to fix your mind on the good, the old woman says we have done. “One thing, my child, let me caution you against. It is a vulgar notion that all rich people are selfish and cold hearted. I know many, many rich people who bestow their gifts so freely and so tenderly, that we may say they are ' like apples of silver in baskets of gold :' that is, that the manner and feeling with which they are given, are still more beautiful and valuable than the gift.' "Dear William, I made a great many mistakes in writing down what mother said; but she corrected them for me; and the rest of my letter I have written without being helped at all. I hate to be helped; don't you? “Mother has not yet told me why she does not go to aunt Ray's to spend the winter: but now my bad feelings have cleared off, I am sure she does right; and besides, as the old ladies say, I don't think it would be at all suitable to leave my family, (pigeons and bantams,) in the winter: and mother and I have a great many plans of reading and studying, and making new-year's gifts. But hush; I must not let out that secret. Writing to you, William, is just like opening the door of a bird-cage; everything that is in my heart flies out. "21 days, 504 hours, 30240 minutes, 1814400 seconds, and then dear Will, you will return to your affectionate sister MARY. "Postscript. Mother says you must not skip her little bit of a sermon when you read the letter; but I am not afraid—you are never tired of what mother says.—M. S. "N. B. A pretty long letter, I think, for a girl not eight years old!—M. S," *Our young town readers may not know that the fowls are very apt to have their combs frozen in extreme cold weather. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource "Mary Smith" Subject The topic of the resource Children's Fiction, Class Difference, Letter Writing, Republicanism Description An account of the resource A young girl from a modest family is hurt by another young girl from a wealthy family. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sedgwick, Catharine M. Stockbridge, S. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Juvenile Miscellany V2 (edited by Mrs. LM [Lydia Maria] Child) Boston: p. 110-134 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Allen and Ticknor Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource May 1829 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource J. Robinson Relation A related resource Sequel to “The Good Son” in Juvenile Miscellany (Jan. 1829): 217-29 Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Document Consumption Country Fall Juvenile Miscellany Nature New York religion tears