Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843

PART III

The meeting was a singular and a melancholy one. The news from France had become hourly more fearful. Every packet brought accounts of new outrages. Paris was already in the power of the populace. The struggle continued, however hopelessly, in the provinces, just enough to swell the losses of noble life, and the conflagrations of noble property. To these wounds of feeling had now to be added sufferings of a still more pressing nature; their remittances had begun to fail. The property which they had left in the hands of their Parisian bankers had either become valueless by the issue of assignats, which no one would take, or confiscated in the general plunder of the banks, whose principals had been thrown into prison, on suspicion of being worth robbing. All was bankruptcy.

The duchess made a slight attempt, evidently a painful one, to explain to us, as strangers, the purpose of their unusual meeting. It was simply, that "the emigrant noblesse, who had already experienced so much heroic hospitality from their English friends, thought that the time was come when they ought to be burdens on them no longer. The letters from France are dreadful," said she, "and it will be our duty to show, that as we have enjoyed prosperity, we can submit to suffering. We must prepare to earn our bread by those accomplishments which we acquired in happier times, and, as we once supposed, for happier times."

A general sigh seemed to break from every heart, and Mariamne hung on the hand of the duchess, and grew pale. There was a silence for a while; at length she resumed—"We must not return to our own country, at least until this horrid struggle is at an end; for we should only embarrass those who have sent us to the protection of this generous land, and for whose sake we live. Yet, we only do honour to them by avoiding to eat the bread of dependence, while we can labour for ourselves." Those words, few as they were, were uttered with many a pause, and in the low tone of a true mourner. She then called a beautiful girl towards her. The girl rose, hesitated, and sank again. "Clotilde, my love, here are none but friends; we must forget every thing but patience and our country." As she spoke, the duchess took her contribution from her hand; it was a drawing of some size, and of singular elegance—an Arcadian festival. It was sent round the room with universal admiration; and the ice thus once broken, a succession of proficients followed, bringing the produce of their talents; some, miniatures—some, sketches of French and Swiss scenery—some, illustrations of Racine and the French theatre; and, of course, many with embroidery, and the graceful works of the needle. Strangers are too apt to conceive that Paris is France and that the frivolity of life in the capital was always its model in the provinces. I here saw evidence to the contrary, and was not a little surprised to see performances so seldom to be found among the French arts, as admirable oil-paintings, carvings in ivory, marble busts, and bas-reliefs, casts of antique vases and groups, and even models of the chief temples and palaces of antiquity. The leisure of the chateau was often vividly, and even vigorously employed; and while the youths of the great families were solely directed to military prospects, the females often acquired solid and grave accomplishments. In short, we had among us as many artificers, not a few of them delicate and lovely, as could have furnished a Tower of Babel, if not built it; but our fabric would have had one exception, it would have had no "confusion of tongues;" for tongues there were none to be heard among us—all was silence, but when some work of striking beauty, and this was not unfrequently the case, was handed round with a murmur of applause.

The harp and piano were then brought forward and this was the most trying part of all—not from any want of skill in the performers, for the majority were perfect on both instruments, but from the nature of the performances themselves. France is not renowned for native music, but neither Italian genius, nor German science, has produced more exquisite little snatches of melody than are to be found in some of the nooks and corners of the provinces. Paris is, like other capitals, an epitome of the world; but Languedoc, the wild country of Auvergne, the Vosges mountains, the hidden and quiet vales of Normandy, and even the melancholy sands of the Breton, have airs of singular and characteristic sweetness. Gretry and Rousseau were but their copyists. Sorrow, solitude, and love, are every where, and their inspiration is worth all the orchestras in the globe.

Those simple airs were more congenial to the depressed spirits of the whole assemblage than the most showy bravuras; and, sung by those handsome creatures—for beauty adds a charm to everything—retained me spell-bound. But, on the performers, and their circle of hearers, the effect was indescribable. All the world knows, that there is nothing which revives memories like music. Those were the airs which they had heard and sung from their infancy; the airs of their early companionships, hopes, and perhaps loves; sung in their gardens, their palaces, at their parents' knees, by the cradles of their children, at their firesides, every where combining with the heart. Sung now in their exile, they brought back to each heart some recollection of the happiest scenes and fondest ties of its existence. No power of poetry, nor even of the pencil, could have brought the past so deeply, so touchingly, with such living sensibility, before them. There at least, was no acting, no display, no feigned feeling—their country, their friends, the perils of husband and brother in the field, the anguish, almost the agony, of woman's affection—and what can equal that affection?—was in the gestures and countenances of all before me. Some wept silently and abundantly; some buried their faces on their knees, and by the heaving of their bosoms alone, showed how they felt; some sat with their large eyes fixed on heaven, and their lips moving as in silent prayer; some almost knelt, with hands clasped and eyes bent down, in palpable supplication. Stranger as I was to them and theirs, it was painful even to me. I felt myself doubly an intruder, and was thinking how I might best glide away, when I saw Mariamne, in an attempt like my own, to move, suddenly fall at the feet of the duchess. She had fainted. I carried her into the open air, where she soon recovered. "Do you wish to return, Mariamne?" said I. She looked at me with amazement. "Return! It would kill me. Let us go home." I placed her on her horse, and we moved quietly and sadly away.

"That was a strange scene," said I, after a long interval of silence.

"Very," was the laconic reply.

"I am afraid it distressed you," I observed.

"I would not have seen it for any consideration, if I could have known what it was;" she answered with a new gush of tears. "Yet what must my feelings be to theirs? They lose every thing."

"But they bear the loss nobly. Still they have not lost all, when they can excite such sympathy in the mind of England. They have found at least an asylum; but what was the object of this singular meeting?"

"Oh, who can tell what they are dreaming of in their distraction?" she said with a deep sigh. "It was probably to turn their talents to some account; to send their works to London, and live by them—poor things, how little they know of London!—or, perhaps, to try their chance as teachers, and break their hearts in the trial. Revolutions are terrible things!" We lapsed into silence again.

"I pity most the more advanced in life," I resumed. "They have been so long accustomed to all the splendours of Paris, that living here must be felt with incurable humiliation. The young are more elastic, and bear misfortune by the mere spirit of youth; and the lovely find friends every where. Did you observe the noble air, the almost heroine look, of that incomparable girl who first showed her drawing?" Mariamne shot a quick glance at me.

"You have quite forgotten her name, I suppose?" said she, with a scrutinizing look.

"Not wholly. I think the duchess called her Clotilde."

"I shall set you at ease, sir, upon that point," said she smartly. "But of one thing I can assure you, and it is, that she is engaged to be married to her second cousin, the Marquis de Montrecour. So, you see, it is scarcely worth your while to enquire any thing more of her name, as she is about to change it so soon—but it is De Tourville, a descendant of the renowned admiral, who lost a renowned French fleet a hundred years ago, an event not unusual in French history. You observe, Mr Marston, I give you most willingly all the information in my power."

I have never presumed to have a master key to female hearts; but there was something half contemptuous, half piqued, in my fair companion's tone, and a rapid interchange of red and pale in her cheeks, which set me musing. She touched her horse with her fairy whip, and cantered a few paces before me. I followed, as became a faithful squire. She suddenly reined up, and said, in the voice of one determined that I should feel the full point of the sting—"Oh, I had forgot. I beg a thousand pardons. Yesterday the Marquis arrived in London. His proposal reached Madame la Comtesse this morning, the young lady's mother—your heroine, I think you called her. The trousseau will probably be sent down from London in a week, unless she shall go to town to choose it, which is the more likely event, as among French ladies the trousseau is generally a more important matter than the gentleman; and then, I presume, you will be relieved from all anxiety upon the subject."

I was all astonishment. The language would have been an impertinence in any one else; yet, in the pretty and piquant Mariamne, it was simply coquettish. At any other time or place I might have felt offended; but I was now embarrassed, wordless, and plunged in problems. Why should I be concerned in this news? What was the opinion of this butterfly to me? yet its sarcasm stung me: what was Clotilde to me? yet I involuntary wished the Marquis de Montrecour at the bottom of the Channel; or what knew I of French tastes, or cared about trousseaux? yet, at that moment, I peevishly determined to take no more rambles in the direction of the Emigrant cottages, and to return to town at once, and see what sort of absurdity a French marriage present looked at my first step in Bond Street.

But this was destined to be a day of adventures. I had led her a circuit through the Downs, in the hope of reviving her by the fresh air before we reached the villa; and we were moving slowly along over the velvet turf, and enjoying that most animating of all the breaths of sky or earth—the sea-breeze; when Mariamne's steed—one of the most highly manèged, and most beautiful of animals, began to show signs of restlessness, pricked up his ears, stopped suddenly, and began to snuff the gale with an inflated nostril. As if the animal had communicated its opinions to its fellow, both our horses set off at a smart trot, the trot became a canter, the canter a gallop. Mariamne was a capital horsewoman and the exercise put her in spirits again. After a quarter of an hour of this volunteer gallop, from the top of one of the Downs we saw the cause—the Sussex hunt, ranging the valley at our feet. Our horses were now irrestrainable, and both rushed down the hill together. The peril of such a descent instantly caught all eyes. A broad and high fence surrounded the foot of the hill, and, wildly as we flew down, saw that the whole hunt had stopped in evident alarm. In another moment we had reached the fence. Mariamne's horse, making a desperate spring, flew over it. Mine failed, and threw me into the middle of the hedge. I was stunned, the sight left my eyes; and, when I opened them again, a man of peculiarly striking countenance, and stately figure, was raising me from the ground, while an attendant was pouring brandy down my throat. My first thought was of my unfortunate companion. "Where is the lady? Is she safe? What has become of her?" were my first exclamations. "Are you much hurt," enquired the stranger. "No, no," I cried; "where is the lady?" "I hope by this time safe," said he; "some gentlemen of the party have followed her: her horse has run away with her; but they will doubtless overtake her in a few minutes." He ascended a small rising ground close to us, and stood gazing in the distance. "No, they are following her still. She keeps her seat. They are now taking a short cut to intercept her. They are close up.—No, that mad animal of a horse has thrown them all out again, he springs over every thing; yet she still holds on. What a capital horsewoman!" While he uttered those broken exclamations I rolled on the ground in torture. At length, after a pause, I heard him say, in a shuddering voice, "All's over! that way leads direct to the cliff."

At the words, though dizzy with pain, and scarcely able to see, I seized the bridle of the groom's horse, who had alighted to assist me; without a word sprang on his back, and dashing in the spur was gone like an arrow. The whole group soon followed.

From the first rising ground, I saw the frightful chase continued. Mariamne's hat had fallen off, and her hair and habit were flying in the wind. She was bending to the neck of her steed, whom the pursuit of the hunt, and the sight of their red coats, had evidently frightened. He was darting, rather than galloping along, by wild bounds, evidently growing feeble, but still distancing his pursuers. Half dead with pain and terror, I could scarcely hold the bridle, and was soon overtaken by the stranger. "Sir," said he, "you are exhausted, and will never be able to overtake the unfortunate lady in that direction. I know the country—follow me." Unable to answer, I followed; with my ears ringing with a thousand sounds, and my thoughts all confusion—I was awoke from this half stupor by a tremendous outcry.

On the brow of the hill before me, were the dozen jaded riders, forced to draw rein by the steepness of the declivity, and all pointing with vehement gestures below. In the next instant, through the ravine at its foot, and within a hundred yards of the cliff, came Marianne, still clinging to the horse, and flying like the wind. The look which she cast upon me, as she shot by, haunted me for years after, whenever an image of terror rose in my dreams. Her eyes were starting from their sockets, her lips gasping wide, her visage ghastliness itself. Another moment, and all must be over; for at the end of the valley was the cliff, a hundred and fifty feet high. I rushed after her. The sight of the sea had struck her at once. She uttered a scream, and fell with her forehead on the horse's neck. Even that movement probably checked him, for he reared, and before his feet touched the ground again I was close to him; with a frantic effort I caught his bridle, and swept his head round. Mariamne fell, voiceless, sightless, and breathless, into my arms. The spot where she was saved was within a single bound of the precipice.

The hunters now came round us, and all was congratulation. Our escape was pronounced to be "miraculous;" I was complimented on all kinds of heroism; and the stranger, evidently the chief personage of the circle, after giving the glance of a connoisseur at poor Mariamne's still pallid, yet expressive, countenance, thanked me, "for having allowed him to breathe at last, which he had not done, he believed, for some minutes, through terror." Nothing could exceed the graceful interest which he expressed in my companion's safety. His grooms were sent to look for assistance in all quarters, and it was not until a carriage had arrived from the next village, and he had seen Mariamne placed in it, that he could be persuaded to take his leave. Even in after life, when I saw him in the midst of the splendour of the world, himself its ruling star, and heard him so often quoted as

I thought that he never deserved the title more than when I saw him perform the duties of simple good-nature to two unknown individuals on a wild heath on the Sussex shore That stranger was the Prince of Wales!

This adventure, by all the laws of romance, should have made me fall in love with Mariamne, or Mariamne fall in love with me. But reality has laws of a different kind, and the good fortune of being just in time to save a lady's life, whether on horseback or on foot, whether in lake or river, whatever it might be in any other ages, is not necessarily a pledge of eternal constancy in our times. That she was grateful, I fully believe, for her nature was innocent and kind; but confession was out of the question, for neither during our rapid drive home, nor for some days after, was she capable of uttering one word. Alarm had reduced her to a state of exhaustion next to death. Her slight frame had been so shaken that she was as helpless as a child; and almost the only sin of consciousness which she gave, was her shrinking from the sight of the sea whenever she was led towards the window, and her hiding her head in her shawl at every sound of the surge.

It may be true, that if the choice depended on her father I should have been the possessor of her fair hand, and the heir to his half million, and equally true, that the event might have saved me a million of troubles. Even at this hour, I sometimes cannot help thinking how total a change must have been given to my anxious career—how many desperate struggles I should have escaped, if I had thus found my path covered, like an eastern potentate's, with cloth of gold! From my first step, how many privations, nay pangs, would have been utterly unknown to me in climbing up the steeps of life, if I had been lifted on the broad and easy pinions of opulence; how little I should have suffered from that reptilism which lurks in every thicket of public life, and every where with a sting; if I had gone through existence, like another Rasselas in his valley of imperishable summer, guarded from all the inclemencies of fortune, and surrounded with all the enjoyments of man!

And yet, who can tell that the very ease of such a destiny might not have wearied my heart, enervated my mind, and rendered me at once burdensome to myself and useless to the world? Is it not hunger that gives the true zest to the banquet, however exquisite, and labour that gives the true charm to the couch, however embroidered? Is not the noblest enjoyment of the noblest mind to be found it the consciousness that we have done something in our generation; that we have contributed a stone to the pyramid of the national renown, that our lips have swelled the echoes of imperial glory? What can reconcile the man of powerful intellect to the consciousness that he has passed through life a cipher, and left nothing behind him but a tomb?

I had now to undergo the temper of Mordecai. The sight of a post-chaise flying along the shore, with one of the royal grooms as outrider, had brought him and all the inmates of the villa to the door. From our furious haste it was evident to them all that some extraordinary circumstance had caused the long delay of their young mistress. From the entrance of the avenue I saw Mordecai standing, straight and silent as one of the pillars of his gate, with his arms folded, and his eye lowering under his huge brow, like one prepared for calamity. But when the carriage drove up to the door, and I raised his helpless and ashy-coloured daughter in my arms, he gazed for an instant on her, and with a howl like that of a wild animal pierced by bullet or steel, fell on his face on the ground. He evidently thought that she was dead.

Even when she opened her feeble eyelids, smiled, and took his hand, he could scarcely be persuaded that she was still alive. He raved, he tore his hair, he vowed deathless vengeance, and the vengeance of all his race, against the murderer of his child, "his beloved, the child of his soul, the last scion of his name, his angel Mariamne." Rage and tears followed each other in all the tempest of oriental fury. No explanation of mine would be listened to for a moment, and I at length gave up the attempt. The grooms had given the outline of the story; and Mordecai charged me with all kinds of rashness and folly. At one time rushing forward to the couch where she lay, faintly attempting to soothe him, he would fling himself on his knees beside her, kiss her forehead, and upbraid himself for all his fancied harshness to her in the course of his life. Then suddenly starting on his feet, with the spring of a tiger, he would bound towards me, his powerful features distended with rage, his deep eye flashing, and his bony hand clenched as if it grasped a dagger, cursing the hour "when I had first set my foot under his unhappy roof," or cast my "evil eye upon the only child of the undone Mordecai." Ever in all the scene, the thought struck me, of what would be the effect of a hundred thousand such men, sweeping with scymetar and lance over the fields of Palestine? The servants fled in terror, or lurked in different directions until the storm should be gone down. At length Mariamne, dreading an actual collision between us, rose with an effort, tottered across the room, and threw her arms around her father's neck. The old man was conquered at once; his countenance grew calm; he sat down upon the floor, and with his daughter hiding her face in his bosom, wept silently and long. When I saw him thus quieted, I left them together, and retired to my chamber, determined to leave the discovery of his error to his returning judgment; and reinforced in my intention to depart for London even at the earliest dawn.

I employed myself for a while in packing up my few equipments for the journey, but this was soon done, and the question was, how to get rid of the remainder of the evening. I was resolved to meet Mordecai no more; and the servant who announced that dinner was ready, was sent back with an answer, that a violent headach prevented my leaving my room. The headach was true; and I had a reluctance equally true to see the "human face divine" for that evening at least. There was one exception to that reluctance, for thoughts had begun to awake in me, from which I shrank with something little short of terror. There was one "human face divine" which I would have made a pilgrimage round the world to see—but it was not under the roof of Mordecai. It was in one of the little cottages on which I was then looking from my window, and yet which seemed placed by circumstances at an immeasurable distance from me. It was the countenance of a stranger—one with whom I had never exchanged a word, who was probably ignorant of my existence, whom I might never see again, and yet whom I had felt to be my fate. Such are the fantasies, the caprices of that most fantastic of things—the the unfledged mind. But I have not taken up my pen to write either the triflings or the tendernesses of the heart. I leave to others the beau idéal of life. Mine has been the practical, and it has been stern and struggling. I have often been astonished at the softness in which other minds seem to have passed their day; the ripened pasture and clustering vineyards—the mental Arcadia—in which they describe themselves as having loitered from year to year. Can I have faith in this perpetual Claude Lorraine pencil—this undying verdure of the soil—this gold and purple suffusion of the sky—those pomps of the palace and the temple, with their pageants and nymphs, giving life to the landscape, while mine was a continual encounter with difficulty—a continual summons to self-control? My march was like that of the climber up the side of Ætna, every step through ruins, the vestiges of former conflagration—the ground I trode, rocks that had once been flame—every advance a new trial of my feelings or my fortitude—every stage of the ascent leading me, like the traveller, into a higher region of sand or ashes, until, at the highest, I stood in a circle of eternal frost, and with all the rich and human landscape below fading away in distance, or covered with clouds, looked down only on a gulf of fire.