Monday came, but not Mr. Evelyn, nor did the whole week
bring him. His absence can be accounted for. He exhibited
symptoms of the Small Pox, a disease the scourge and terror
of the age. He was from a town on the sea-board where the
infection raged. The people of Livingston immediately took
the alarm, town meetings were held, a Pock House was established,
Mr. Evelyn conveyed thither, and a general beating
up for patients was had throughout the town. All who had

[figure description] Page 271.[end figure description]

been exposed were ordered to the Hospital, and candidates for
the disease universally were taken thither. This number was
made up chiefly of youths of both sexes. Margaret and Obed
were both sent for; Rose escaped by secreting herself in the
woods.

The house selected for the terrible ordeal, was that known
as Col. Welch's, the Tory absentee, now used as a Poor House,
a large building, occupying a commanding site on the west
side of the village, north of Deacon Hadlock's Pasture, and
detached from the highway by a deep front yard, which was
once ornamented with gravel walks and flower-beds, but of
late years had been abandoned to the pleasure of swine. In
the rear the grounds extended a long distance, also intersected
by walks, shaded by a grove of forest trees, and rising to an
eminence where were the ruins of a Summer-house. Above
the ridge of the Hospital, on a long pole, waved a blood-red
flag, an admonition to all of the fearful disease that was there
doing its work. Guards were set about the premises to prevent
all unlicensed ingress or departure.

Margaret, having been brought from home by the authorities
of the town, was shut in a room with several other young
ladies then and there awaiting the process of inoculation by
Dr. Spoor. Among the number she found Isabel Weeks, who,
at the instance of the latter, introduced her to Susan Morgridge.
It being supposed that Margaret and Susan might have received
the disease in the natural way, they two were for a few
days consigned to a room by themselves. Margaret's first
inquiries related to Mr. Evelyn, who the nurse told her was
very sick in the male apartment, but not in apparent danger;
Susan supplied her with other particulars respecting her cousin,
for whom she expressed the highest esteem, and it might have
been a little flattering to Margaret to know how kindly he had
spoken of her in the Judge's family. Susan, sobered by the
recent death of her mother, serious by nature, and of a retiring
disposition, was yet most excellent company for Margaret.
She possessed amiability and good sense, sweetness and
strength, cultivated manners and great delicacy of sentiment,
and she was not one to condemn all that she could not approve.
For the first time in her life, Margaret had a bed-fellow,
if we except Bull. No symptoms of the natural disease
appearing, and the virus with which they were charged begining
to develop itself, the enviable privilege of solitude, which
these two enjoyed, was disturbed, and they were reduced to
the common lot, and became occupants of a chamber where

[figure description] Page 272.[end figure description]

were four beds, alternatingly from five to eight patients, three
or four nurses, and a stagnant atmosphere—ventilation being
prohibited for fear of taking cold. It boots not to describe
that Middle Passage of the Pock House, or follow from day to
day the progress of a dreadful disorder;—the primary dullness
and lassitude, succeeded by fever and ague, the hot, blinding
eruption, sharp, darting pains, the swollen face, the sore
throat, tiresome sleep, haunted dreams, convulsions, delirium,
blindness; a noisome air, slow haggard midnights, inflamed,
nettlesome noontides; jalap and the lancet; saffron and mary-gold
infusions, rum and brandy, applied to “throw the eruption
from the heart;” the body half roasted with blisters to
keep the disease from “striking in.” Thanks to Lady Mary
Wortley Montague and the Turks for our lives indeed, and
thanks to Dr. Jenner and the cows for our comfort! The
aspect of the town was suddenly transformed, the streets were
comparatively deserted, the people wore their faces lengthened
and distressful, and stealthlike was all intercourse. Prayers
multiplied for the sick, sermons were preached on the vanity
of life. It is a wonder that so many of the number returned
again to their homes, in fact only two died, one a boy, from
the North Part of the town; the other, a friend of Margaret's,
and sister of Isabel's, Helen Weeks. Unshriven, unblest,
she died; at midnight, without prayer, or funeral, or
passing bell, was she buried; by the hands of the sexton,
Deacon Ramsdill, and her own father and mother, was she
laid in the grave, which closed over one as pure in heart and
guileless in life as this world often produces.

She, whose especial province was the health of the people,
the Widow Wright, could not fail to bestir herself on an occasion
like the present. In Rose's sequestration she aided,
Obed's being taken to the Hospital she opposed, and however
hostile to the practice of the Faculty, she still felt it incumbent
upon her to do something. Accordingly, laden with sundry
medicaments, she presented herself one morning at the gate
of the infected grounds. Here presided Captain Eliashib Tuck,
with a staff instead of a firelock—a long black pole barbed
with iron, and formerly used by tythingmen for the admonition
of unruly children on the Sabbath—which he carried with the
precision of a soldier on guard, pacing to and fro, but raised
in a manner somewhat threatening, when he observed the
sedulous lady trying to open the gate.

“Marcy on us, Cappen!” exclaimed the Widow,” ye
wouldn't spile a woman's gear and forsan break her head,

[figure description] Page 273.[end figure description]

for deuin a dight of good, would ye, bein it was Sabber
day?”

“There are the General Orders,” replied the Captain with
sturdy brevity.

On a post the Leech read as follows:—

“1. No person is allowed to enter or leave the grounds
without permission. 2. If a person cause the spread of the
disease, he or she shall be fined fifty pounds. 3. If any person
be inoculated in any other place than the Hospital, he shall
pay forty pounds. 4. No Paper Money to be carried into the
building under penalty of ten pounds.”

“Ha, ha, ha!” snickered out the woman. “More afeerd
of paper money, than they are of the Doctor's knife. I kalkilate,
Cappen, if they'd a kept paper money out of the War,
there wouldn't have been quite so many broke doun.”

“I was in the War,” rejoined the Captain, “and I was afraid
neither of paper money nor British swords. I consider myself
honored by my losses. I am no grumbler. Where is your
countersign, Ma'am? You can pass with a ticket, not without.”

“Ra'aly, you look as if you Cappen Granded it over all
creation, and the Hospital besides. The Doctor has got um
all penned up here. He daren't let um come out and have
fair play. Won't ye let a woman see her boy?”

“The countersign, Ma'am.”

“They'll kill him with jollup and rhubarb. They'll make a
shadder of him, and won't leave enough teu bury him by.”

“I know,” rejoined the Captain, “neither men nor women,
mothers nor children, judges nor ministers. Have you never
heard, when I stood sentry before General Washington's tent,
then only a raw recruit, and the Old Hero himself rode up in
his carriage, I challenged him. `Who goes there?' said I
`General Washington,' said he, looking from the window.
`I don't know General Washington,' said I. `What is the
countersign?' and he had to give it before he could pass one
inch.”

“You had better a stuck teu the Camp, old feller, and gone
out agin the Injins, and not be here a meddlin' with the
sientifikals, and a killin' poor folk's children.”

The Captain, who stood too much on his dignity to take an
affront, replied that she might go to Mr. Adolphus Hadlock's,
where perhaps her services would be valued. “They are
building a Smoke House there,” said he, “and perhaps Aunt
Dolphy will let you pass without the word. The whole family
is in panics.”

[figure description] Page 274.[end figure description]

On this cue, the Widow sidled off up the road, and going
partly by cultivated grounds and partly through the forest, a
short distance this side of Mr. Hadlock's house, she met that
gentleman himself, flurrying in the way, with a long pole which
he flourished with a wild menace, evidently prepared to dispute
the passage with her

“Do you come from the infected precincts?” asked he
with earnest precipitancy, and speaking with what clearness
his nostrils stuffed with sundry herbs would allow. “Aristophanes,
Ethelbert! Ho, here, Holdup, knave! Urania Bathsheba,
my little daughter, run back, run for your life!”

“I han't been nigh the smittlish consarn,” said the Leech.
“Cock on a hoop! Don't be so adradd. I wouldn't tech it
sooner a cow'd eat elder blows. I've come up teu help ye.
What have you got in yer nose?”

“Rue and wormwood—don't come near—our lives depend
on it. Do, Sophronisba, my dear wife, do supply Holdup, his
has fallen to the ground. Never mind if he is our servant,
the safety of the whole of our darling family is at stake.”

“I've got the stuff in my pocket,” said the Leech, “the
gennewine sientifikals, what 'll keep off the pest, and cure it
when it comes. I am as sound as a new born baby. Let us
see what you are deuin here.”

“These are direful days, Mistress Wright,” responded Mr.
Hadlock. “Our son Socrates, and Purintha Cappadocia our
daughter dear, are already under treatment at the Hospital;
and as the law allows and our duty enjoins, we are aiming to
prevent the spread of the miasm. We have erected a fumitory
for the more complete cleansing of all that pass this way.—
Cecilia Rebecca, my dear, do go back and continue your
prayers—”

“I can't find it, Papa.”

“That on The Visitation of the Sick.”

“Where, Papa, where is it?”

“Take the first you come to, one is as good as another in
such a case as this; run child.—Don't approach too near the
good lady, Aristophanes, lest your garments should brush.
Keep the rags burning, my dear Ethelbert.”

“Don't be so despit skeered, Mr. Hadlock,” said the Widow.
“Bein I was steeped in their pus and pizens, I tell ye, I can
keep ye clear and wholesome, as ye was born.”

At the edge of the woods, a rude structure had been hastily
thrown up, of staddles interlaced with boughs, and within were
quantities of water, soap, salt and vinegar. Over a heap of

[figure description] Page 275.[end figure description]

charcoal and cobs, the Widow beheld a woman crouched, in a tattered
and begrimed long-short, with the collar open exposing a
dingy neck and broad shoulders, and blowing lustily at the fire
which she was striving to kindle with her breath.

“How d'y'e?—Sibyl, for sartain,” said the Leech. “Wal
if you an't here, pon my soul!”

“How's the Widder? I am glad you've come,” responded
Sibyl Radney, for it was she, intermitting her labors, and
looking up.

“Get the pile ignited, exclaimed Mr. Hadlock; “we can't
lose any time.”

“Then you must have some fire,” replied Sibyl; “I can't
make a puss out of a sow's ear, nor light cobs with my windwipe,
death or no death.”

“Where is the tinder-box. I thought you had struck a fire.
Haste, Holdup, knave, get some fresh coals. Havn't you been
for the brimstone yet, Ethelbert, my son?”

“You told me to keep the rags burning, Papa”

“Never mind what I told you, run to Deacon Penrose's, but
don't, for dear Heaven's sake, go by the road, speed down
across the woods.”

“A tough case, I can tell you, Miss Wright,” said Sibyl,
rising to her feet. “But we mean to stop the plague. We
are going to catch every scrag that comes this way from the
Pest, and soak, smoke, salt and rub them, till there isn't a
hang-nail of the pock left. They won't get off so easy as the
Colonel did. The law gives it and we'll do it. Here comes
Miss Dunlap, and Miss Pottle and Comfort.”

“We are all in a toss in our neighborhood,” said Mistress
Pottle. “I got Comfort to come down with me, and see how
things were doing. Sylvina is there, if she an't dead before
this.”

“We heard there was seventeen dead up to yesterday,” said
Mistress Dunlap, “and four to be buried to-night; we havn't
had a word from our Myra since they took her down.”

“It's cruel skeersom about there, I knows,” said the Widow.
“I jest kum up, and I had a tight rub teu git by. I kalkilate
my son Obed is lying stone dead there now.”

“Lord have mercy!” exclaimed Mistress Pottle. “Comfort,
you go to felling trees across the way.”

“They are killin' um with the lancet, and starvin' um to
death with milk-sops,” said the Widow. “Here's white cohush,
it 'll bring out the whelk in less than no time; brooklime
will break any fever. There's lavender and horse-mint,

[figure description] Page 276.[end figure description]

and calamus to burn when you go inteu the room. I've got um
here, but they won't let me go nigh um.”

“Halloo!” shouted Comfort Pottle, who was busy cutting
the trees. “There's Soc. coming up the road!”

“Ah Socrates, my dear son!” cried the father, seizing a
pole, and rushing forwards, followed by the others. “How,—
why—what has happened?—My dear Triandaphelda Ada,
don't be alarmed—Don't come near, my dear son—What shall
we do—Are you well?—Holdup, knave, where is your crow-bar?—
Don't cry, Sophronisba, my—He is upon us—my dear
son—we shall all be killed!”—

“I wasn't going to stay any longer,” replied the boy, who
with no other vestment than his shirt, was now rapidly approaching
the party. “It didn't take. I stole off through the
barn and got into the woods. I havn't had any thing but sour
whey and barley water this week. If I could get the smell of
mother's buttery, the Doctor shouldn't know me for one
month.”

“Bide back,” said Comfort, striking forwards with his axe.

“Don't come nigh me,” said Holdup, clenching his crow-bar.

“He 'll get well combed before he gets through this,” said
Sibyl Radney, advancing with a long branch of a tree, which
she shook in her brawny arms.

“Let us all retreat a little,” said Mr. Hadlock, “and form
with our several instruments a line both of offence and defence,
along which, Socrates, do you proceed into the Fumitory. It
is a case, my dear son, in which our parental feelings must
yield for a moment to our severer judgment; but the conflict
will soon be over. When you are in take off your shirt, and
lay it in the tub of water; and so dispose yourself over the
burning heap that the smoke will reach your whole body.”
The boy obedient to the paternal wishes entered the lodge,
where he was presently followed by his parents and some of the
women. Meanwhile, being missed from the Hospital, two or
three servants were despatched for him. Hastening up the
road, and dispersing whatever force was opposed to them, they
broke in without ceremony upon the process the runaway at
the moment was undergoing. Four women, one at each extremity,
held him face downwards over the fumes of coal, sulphur,
lavender and calamus, while the Widow was rubbing his
back with vinegar. Mr. Hadlock stood a suitable distance
from the tub stirring the shirt with a long pole. As the pursuers
entered, this gentleman, uttering a faint scream, bolted

[figure description] Page 277.[end figure description]

through the sides of the hatch. At the cost of a sharp but
short altercation with the women, the boy was delivered up,
and duly appareled, returned to the Hospital;—whither, as
some of these good mothers are going, let us also betake ourselves.

These ladies from the smoke-house encountered some other
elderly women who, with a slow step and solemn air, came up
the West Street; among whom were Mistresses Whiston, Joy,
Hoag, Ravel and Brent, whose names have already been mentioned.

“Can't any of us be admitted?” enquired Mistress Whiston
of Captain Tuck.

“Not if the Great Queen Catherine herself should apply on
her knees before me,” replied the trusty warden.

“Do you know how our little Joan is doing?” said the lady.

“None I believe are considered dangerous since the death
of Helen Weeks,” rejoined the Captain.

“Poor Miss Weeks!” ejaculated Mistress Whiston.

“Mournful times these!” added Mistress Joy.

“It is most as bad as the Throat Distemper that was round
when I was a gal,” said one of the ladies; “there were more
dead than alive.”

“So it was in the Rising of the Lights,” said another.

“What is that to the Camp Fever, we had in the War!”
echoed the Captain. “There were two thousand sick at one
time, and never a quarter recovered; and we had to march,
sick or well, alive or dead.”

“That tells how our Luke came to his end,” said Mistress
Dunlap.

“And how glorious it was to die for one's country!” said
the Captain.

“That was nothing to the Great Earthquake when I was a
gal, and lived to the Bay,” said Mistress Joy. “The
spindle and vane on Funnel Hall was blown down, chimblys
were cracked, brick and tile choked up the streets. It sounded
as if God Almighty's chariot was trundling over the pavements
in Old Marlboro.”

“That was the same year one of the niggers in Kidder-minster
cut his master and mistresses' throat, as I have heard
Ma'am tell,' said Sibyl Radney.

“No it was four year arter,” said an elderly lady, “it was
the same year our Prudence was born, and that was just four
year arter the Earthquake.—I can remember an old Indian
slave we had at our house, one of the Nipmucks, and what a

[figure description] Page 278.[end figure description]

time we had of it. Daddy kept him chained nights, but he
broke away, and killed one of the men that was sent arter him;
and he was hung the next week. I remember Dad's saying,
`There goes twenty pounds.' But he wouldn't work, and
wan't worth his hide.”

“The Indians and Negroes never did us much good,” said
Mistress Whiston; “and I am glad there are going to be no
more slaves.”

“I kalkilate as much,” said the Widow, “if you had seen
the niggers burnt alive down teu York, nigh fifty of um, for
bringing in the Papists. My Granther was on the spot and saw
it all, and said it did his heart good teu see the fat fry out of the
sarcy dogs.”

“I remember,” said the Widow Brent, who was a little deaf,
“milking a cow a whole winter for a half a yard of ribbin.”

“I remember,” said Mistress Ravel, “the Great Hog, up in
Dunwich, that hefted nigh twenty score.”

“Morrow to ye, Good Wives. Are you not running some
risk here?” said a voice behind them, that of Deacon Hadlock,
whose approach the ladies, diverted by memories of other
days, and transported to scenes of legendary horror, had not
perceived.

“I don't know but we are a matter exposed,” said Mistress
Whiston.

“I had as lief go right inteu it arm's length,” said the
Leech.

“The danger is that you might carry it away in your
clothes,” answered the Deacon. “I have no business here,
but I saw ye all, and I thought I would just ride up and give
ye a friendly warning.”

While these ladies disperse it is safe for the rest of us to
remain; and by methods which the vigilance of Captain Tuck
cannot counteract we will enter the forbidden spot.

Favored by a constitution, which often in life stood her in
hand, Margaret has been able to carry forward her disease
more rapidly than many others, and is so far recovered as to
have passed from the sick chamber through the “Cleansing
Apartment,” and is now almost sole occupant of the “Clean
Room.” Glad enough is she to exchange mint-tea and jalap
for water-gruel and milk-porridge. She goes out into the
open air. The aspect of things has changed during her confinement.
The verdure of nature shows in gold and crimson
colors. The frosts have fallen, and the flowers are drooping;
Summer is giving place to Autumn. The fresh air of the

[figure description] Page 279.[end figure description]

heavens and the free tread of the earth were an exhilaration.
But when she saw a morning glory with its
black, blistered leaves, heard the feeble notes of the birds
wailing a farewell to our northern latitudes, and the mournful
underflowing murmurs of the crickets that so betoken
a fading season; and especially when she thought of Helen
Weeks, whose death occurred in the same chamber with
her, but at a time when she could be hardly conscious of what
transpired, she was seized with a deep melancholy, so that,
in her present debilitated state, she well nigh fainted, and
staggering with weakness and a burdensome sense of evil, she
went back to the house. Sorrow for the death of a friend
she never before experienced, nor was she in a condition the
most apt for meeting it. She sank in a chair by the window,
turned her face from all, and her thoughts wandered confusedly,
painfully, darkly, over the trees, the landscape, the sky,
God and the Universe. Susan Morgridge and Isabel Weeks
were yet in the sick-room, the latter at a point of dangerous
reduction, so much so that her convalescence was for some
months delayed. Of Mr. Evelyn she heard he had passed the
hands of the cleansers, but she saw nothing of him. To the
Clean ones, with whom she was now associated, she might
have addressed herself, but they were strangers to her, and the
freedom and spirits which most of them seemed to enjoy, rendered
the weight in her feelings more intolerable, and she was
constrained to keep by herself, and spent a good part of two
days in solitary reverie by the window. On the third day she
had the good fortune to see Mr. Evelyn walking in the garden,
cloaked and muffled, and tears in fresh large drops rose into
her eyes. Presently he sent by one of the attendants a summons
to herself, which she could not but obey. Clearing her
eyes, throwing on shawl and bonnet, she went out. Her face,
ordinarily animated with the colors of health and hope, was
stricken and sorrowful, and bore evident traces of sickness
and disappointment; nor was the appearance of Mr. Evelyn,
altogether dissimilar. He took her hand cordially, and spoke
to her soothingly. “Helen,” said he, “has indeed gone from
us, as all must go at last. But in Christ, we never die. By
the Atonement are we immortal. Where he is there shall we
be. Possessed of him, death has no terror for us, or power
over us. The trees fade to renew themselves.”

“I have felt,” said she, “that I should never wish to see
another summer, and all beautiful human faces seemed hidden
from me forever. But I hope these feelings will not last
always.”

[figure description] Page 280.[end figure description]

“Beauty and Pureness,” said he, “are everlasting; they
are of God and can never die. They may for a moment be
obscured, but they shall reappear in brighter lustre. Angels
have charge over them that they dash not their foot against a
stone. Let us turn to the pleasant face of God in what is
about us.”

“I wish we were at the Pond, how beautiful it is there in
the Fall! You see the woods that go up there metamorphosed
into great marygolds filled in here and there with a cardinal
flower.”

“They remind one of a flame of fire, still burning, but not
consumed, like the Bush of which the Bible speaks. They
bring to my recollection an army of staff-officers with crimson
coats on roan steeds. Would that all blood were as innocent
as that which yonder straggling trooper of a red-maple is dyed
with! They call up the solemn convocations of our old
fashioned Judges in their scarlet robes.”

“You confound me by such things. I should not like to
look upon trees in that `stand-point;' that savors only of
trainings, rum-drinking and jails. I would rather see in them
the sunsetting, and my dream-clouds.”

“I love the Beautiful wherever I see it, and perhaps sometimes
see it where I should not. But we are not in strength
for any disquisitions of this sort. Let us enjoy without reason.
How long do they keep you here, Miss Hart?”

“I am sure I don't know. I wish I could go home to-day,
but the Committee are very exact, and they may keep me a
month.”

“Dr. Spoor thinks I may be allowed to go day after to-morrow,
and I will intercede with him to let you off. I am
anxious to return home, having already been delayed beyond
my time, as I must sail so soon.”

“I did not know as you had any home. If I had thought
anything about it, I should have imagined you dropped right
out of the sky.”

“I have a home indeed, with a holy mother.”

“I will not laugh, because I cannot laugh. You are so
soon away! I am tired, had we not better return to our
rooms?”

The extensive grounds of Col. Welch were the allotted
limits of the convalescing patients. The next day Margaret
and Mr. Evelyn went out together; they met others like themselves
revelling in their tethered liberties, and enjoying the
sumptuousness of the hour and the place. Conventional

[figure description] Page 281.[end figure description]

distinctions and proprieties were foregone in this general invalid
exuberance, and no surmises were raised or words uttered
while the feeble Indian strolled arm in arm with the feeble
relative of the Judge. An early frost had smitten the vegetation,
but the sun was warm and the air bland. The grove-thridding
walks they pursued, now looking out upon the
village, the salmon-colored woods on the North of the Green,
and the russet mountains beyond the River, now immersed in
the mellow golden trees. They felt the glow of returning
health and invigorated frames, and were grateful for deliverances
often delayed and sometimes never afforded. Red squirrels
chased one another over the yellow leaves that covered
the ground, and along the branches of the trees, yelping and
chattering, like king-fishers. Fox-colored sparrows, titmice,
nuthatches, snow-birds, and the great golden-winged wood-pecker
vied in their notes, and seemed resolved on merriment
while the season lasted. They reached the knoll on which
the old Summer-house stood; by broken steps they ascended,
and on a broken seat they sat down.

“Have you strength enough to sing to me?” said Mr.
Evelyn.

“I will sing you `To Mary in Heaven,”' said Margaret.

The next morning two horses were brought to the gate,
one assigned to Margaret, while Mr. Evelyn mounted the
other.

“Are you going up with me?” said Margaret.

“I brought you down,” replied Mr. Evelyn, “and it is but
fair I should see you back.”

They went through the South Street, entered the Brandon
road, and ascended the long steep hill Margaret had formerly
climbed on her way to Mr. Wharfield's. The Indian Summer
had just begun, a soft haze pervaded the atmosphere, and
settled like a thin grey cloud on the horizon; there was a
delicious, sweet, sleep-like feeling created by all things about,
both inspiring and tranquillizing. Above, and as it were close
to them, the sky rested on red trees and green grass; Mill
Brook dashed and tinkled below as through a bed of roses.
Margaret's horse proved mettlesome, and she reached the
summit-level before Mr. Evelyn.

“I should have a magnificent scene,” said she, turning her
horse and waiting for him, as he came up, “even if I had to
see it all alone. You yourself are a live man and horse in a
field of embroidery such as Mrs. Beach can't equal, and she is
said to be the most skilful needle-worker in town.”

[figure description] Page 282.[end figure description]

“Look at your own Mons Christi,” said he. “All the
looms of the Gobelins could not garnish it so! There is a
solitary maple, like a flamingo on its nest of green cedars and
laurels.”

“How hot those yellow witch-hazles look under the tall
trees, if I were cold I would go in there; and yonder the
dark forest is burning with glowworms and tapers, if I were
gloomy I would go in there. I wish, Mr. Evelyn, you were
going to stay a little longer in Livingston. See that hemlock
so covered with grey moss, and there is a row of red trees
peeping out from green hemlocks behind it. It stands out
alone, you see; its kindred have deserted it, and the mosses
are taking pity on its old age. Will you find anything as
beautiful on the sea-coast, or beyond the sea; the Master
says there is nothing like it in Europe.”

“I do not go to the Old World for its scenery, I only wish
to see Man there. There is nothing like New England, and
nothing in New England like its interior districts. The sea-coast
is more level and uniform; here you have the advantage
of mountain, bluff, interval, to set off the view. This Autumnal
tapestry is hung upon windows and arches, and flung
over battlements. With us it is only spread on the floor.
But why do you notice that old tree? You are too young to
be attracted by age and decay.”

“I don't know—I seem sometimes to have lived half a
century, and again as if I was just born. How many years I
have lived the last month. When I was very young I used
to think this frost-change was owing to yellow bugs, humble-bees
and butterflies lighting on the trees; and then it was
orioles and goldfinches; and afterwards it seemed to me twilight
clouds snowing upon the earth—and now—now—There
is a dash for you, Mr. Evelyn, which the Master says implies
a suspension of the sense. There is sister Ruth coming out
to meet us, let us start our fillies.”

“How is sister Margaret?” said Mrs. Wharfield, advancing
into the street.

“This is Mr. Charles Evelyn,” said Margaret.

“Glad to see thee, Friend Charles. Will ye not tarry
awhile? How is the malady?”

“No,” replied Margaret; “we must hasten homewards.
They are getting better at the Hospital. Helen Weeks is
dead.”

“So we learned. She has found the true light now where-to
the world is dark. Farewell, if you cannot rest. Anthony

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would rejoice to see thee. He has been much moved towards
thee, Margaret.”

They presently met a drove of cows driven by an old man
and a boy.

“That is Kester Shield, Uncle Ket, the cowherd,” said
Margaret. “She he is afraid of us, he is running into the
woods to escape contagion—his cows also are much moved by
our horses, as the Quaker said.”

“Phin! Boy,” shouted the old man hiding himself among
the brush. “Keep clear of the wind of the horses—there—
there, head off the Parson.”

“Uncle Ket, Uncle Ket, don't be scared,” cried Margaret.
“We havn't any of the disease. We are all free. We have
been smoked clean.”

The old man continued to retreat and to cry to his boy.
“Keep out of the wind. We shall lose Miss Luce—the
Parson 'll have them all crazed.”

We must stop this movement,” said Mr. Evelyn. “I will
help the boy, while you ride along by the edge of the woods,
and see if you can compose the old man.”

“The Parson,” said the cow-herd, whom Margaret reached
and quieted, “is the worst pair of horns I ever druv, and I
have had the business now rising of sixty year, and take it by
and large, fifty head a season, and she is the beater of
all.”

“Have you, indeed,” said Mr. Evelyn, “followed the business
so long.”

“I was chose arter Old Increase Tapley died. I was 'prenticed
to Old Increase, but he got to be so old I had it pretty
much all to myself.”

“How old was he?” enquired Mr. Evelyn.

“He was going hard on to seventy-five, when he died,
though he didn't do much for a spell before.”

“How old are you, Sir.”

“I was seventy-two, eighteenth day, March, last; though I
like to have lost one year by them heathenish Papists. Zuds!
you'll begin to think I am getting old too; I never should
have thought of it. I havn't seen an old man this thirty year,
they used to be thick as blackberries when I was a boy; only
there is Old Miss Radney, Sibyl's mother, she's rising of
ninety. But, as I was saying, I was chose the very next
Town Meeting arter Increase died, I took oath under the
Old King — Phin, boy, the Parson's hunching Miss Luce—and
I have been run ever since; fair or foul, wet or dry, bloom or
blow, hot or cold, mud or dust, I stick it through.”

[figure description] Page 284.[end figure description]

“The cows must give you some trouble in your advancing
years,” said Mr. Evelyn.

“O, it an't a circumstance to what it used to be, when the
Injins skulked round and stole my cows, and run off with the
horses—in them days we took all kinds—the troops in the
War pressed some of the best of them, and they tried to make
Uncle Ket make it good; and in Burgwine's time when the
Hissians and Highlanders came through, with their check
backs, long pipes and busky caps, they distarbed them so it
took a whole day to bring them to; and latterly when the
wagons began to come, the whole pack would up and off,
capering and snorting, into the woods. I'm glad you keep to
the saddle, and don't interfere with people's business. They
are fencing in the commons now, and putting their cows to
pastur. I had a calculated to leave a handsome run of business
to my Grandson, Phin. My wife is dead and children,
and he and the cows is all there is left. The cows you see
are dwindled down to less than a quarter. Great changes—
Uncle Ket's trade is most done.—You are a young man, and I
could larn you a good many things. Molly I've known ever
since she was dropt; she has brought in the strays, and many
is the poundage she has saved Uncle Ket. She is brisk-eyed,
full-breasted and straight-limbed, as a Devon heifer; she wants
coaxing and patting a little—she don't run with the old cows
enough to larn their ways,—Glad you got through with the
pock so well—it takes a second time, some say—its worse than
horn-ail, hoven or core—There, Molly, let Bughorn go by, we
will manage them.”

“You see,” said Margaret as they rode on, “there are
things besides trees to remind us of age and regrets. But I
had rather talk of the trees. They become individually developed
by the frosts; you can distinguish them better now
than in the summer.”

“I have known the beauties of the forest only in the aggregate;”
said Mr. Evelyn. “It is a fair whole of form, color
and effect that interests me. What is that orange-crowned tree
glowing so in the sun, over among those pines?”

“That is a rock-maple.”

“These straw-colored trees and that dark purple clump?”

“These are oaks, and that is a grove of wild cherries. I know
them in the Spring, I seem to half lose them in the Summer;
in the Fall they announce themselves again. The red-maple is
deep crimson, that tawny colored grove is beeches, there is the
purple woodbine trailing over the rocks. What a pretty picture

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is that flock of sheep and lambs feeding among the blood-red
blueberries.”

“Here is a solitary maple, so soft, limpid, silken, as if the
Spirit of Color dwelt in its leaves. These are scenes which
Rosa or Poussin could never have commanded.”

“There is some advantage in knowing the detail.”

“Yes, one could not be a Painter or Poet without it.”

“More than that, ourselves are there in those trees. Distress,
like the frosts, brings out all our feelings, light and dark,
cheerful and sombre. The trees have a sympathy with me.
I am but a mottled forest. These last weeks have unfolded
all my colors. You say you sketch sometimes, you cannot
carry me away in your portfolio, I shall only allow you a leaf.
I must grow green again.—See those dark trees above, the
yellow hobble-bush and brakes below, and on the ground the
green arbutus, mosses and wintergreen. The lowest down
the greenest. Let me lie low, where no frosts can touch me.
Shall you ever think of these things when you are away, Mr.
Evelyn?”

“Yes, and I will think of you the Wintergreen, unscathed
by frost, unaffected by changing seasons.”

“Geodic Christian Androidal Wintergreen Indian Molly
Pluck, mater bovum divumque! what a string of names you
put on me! What shall I call you?”

“Let us look a little farther on and perhaps we shall find
something. — Here we open into a tropical grove of lemons
and oranges, the golden fruit glows on the trees and crackles
under the hoofs of our horses; beyond I see a warm sunny
vale of tulips and carnations; truly this cannot be surpassed.”

“What say you to the pool of water under that arbor of
trees? I can count you crimson gooseberry, flaming maples,
claret sumach, yellow birch and what not.”

“Those are garnets, topazes and sapphires set in a dark
rock of polished steel. Indeed look about you, Miss Hart,
would it not seem as if the trees extracted all the colors of
the earth, cobalt, umber, lapis-lazuli, iodine, litharge, chrome,
copper and gold, and compounding them in the sap, drenched
and dyed every leaf; or as if Great Nature herself, making a
canvass of the forests, had painted them as you say with rainbows
and twilight.”

“Do you, Sir, remember what I say?”

“Most certainly I do.”

“So does Job, and Isabel, and I shall have one in Europe,
and two in Livingston to remember me. I never before felt

[figure description] Page 286.[end figure description]

there was a pleasure in being remembered, at least such a
thing never was a thought to me. And all New England, that
you admire so much, you will bear in your heart into Old
England; I wonder what they will think of you! — Here we
come to the Delectable Way.”

They rode in silence up the rough ascent. “Will you
wear this, Miss Hart?” said Mr. Evelyn, at length breaking
the monotony, and offering a ring with a small diamond
stud.

“I will,” replied Margaret, “if my Bona Dea allows it.”

“Who is your Bona Dea?”

“I think it must be Christ, it used to be something else.
I will give you some of these leaves you admire so much; and
there are berries in the woods, the scarlet devil's ear, blue
dracira and crimson cranberries.”

“You must not think of it, you are too weak to leave your
horse. A beautiful wish I shall cherish as much as beautiful
fruit.”

“Here in my stirrup,” said Margaret, “I can get you the
leaves, maples, beeches, cherries, hobble-bush and all. These
leaves will keep their color a long time; there you have
pink, beet, carrot and what not. Don't you lose them.”

Reaching the house, Bull and Dick came out to meet Margaret,
her father handed her from the saddle, Chilion undid
the budget that was strapped to the crupper, and her mother
offered Mr. Evelyn a cup of water. Cæsar, the negro servant
of the Judge whose were the horses, had come up across to
take the spare beast.

“God love you, Margaret,” said Mr. Evelyn.

“Christ love you, Mr. Evelyn,” said Margaret.

Mr. Evelyn, with Cæsar rode off through the trees.

“Dat be one nice gal,” said the Negro speaking to relieve
the quiet of the way, “ef she no hab brack, but only Ingin
blood. She steel-trap.”

“What do you mean, Cæsar?”

“She catch Massa heart.”

“What makes you think so? Was your heart ever caught?”

“Yes, once, Phillis Welch grabbed him in her two hands.”

“Has she got it now.”

“She took him off wid de Curnel ober de seas in de War
time.”

“Don't you love her now?”

“Cæsar hab two lubs, Massa Parson say, when him jine
de Church, de wicked nater lub, and de good God lub, and

[figure description] Page 287.[end figure description]

him kill de wicked nater lub.—Cæsar fraid Massa no tink ob
de Pond wench when him gone.”

“Don't you ever think of Phillis?”

“No; him hab no tink ob Phillis now. De wicked lub
tink get in Cæsar's heart sometimes, and de tears in him eyes.
Massa see Phillis ober de seas, gib Cæsar's lub to Phillis,
but only for de lub ob God's sake. Tell Phillis, Cæsar old,
soon sink in de grabe, meet her in de glory; him hab no wife,
no children for Phillis sake.”

“Can't I think of that young lady, the same as you do of
Phillis?”

“Fear Massa not convarted, hab wicked tink, den no tink,
lub oder faces.”

Margaret, debilitated by her illness, tired by the long ride,
went immediately to her mother's bed. In a short time Rose
appeared, and ministered unto her. The broth of a fresh
chicken was prepared; some peaches Chilion had saved from
her own tree she ate. The next morning she went into the
woods and gathered some of the brilliant leaves, corresponding
to those she gave Mr. Evelyn, and put them carefully
away. She ascended Mons Christi, she looked in the direction
she supposed Mr. Evelyn had gone, she pressed the ring
to her lips, and her handkerchief to her eyes.

“Why do you weep, Margaret?” was an unanticipated
voice.

“Rose! are you here?”

“I followed you up,” said Rose. “You were abstracted.”

“Why do I weep, Rose? I know not why.”

“If you do so, it shall be in my arms. I am stronger
than you to-day, Margaret. Lay your head here and go to
sleep.”

“Nay, Rose, I am very dry, I want some water, let us go
down to the cistern. I shall feel better if I can drink.”

“Not all the waters of the Pond can quench your thirst,
Margaret, methinks—but I will go down with you.”

“Let us go, and then we will have some plums Judge Morgridge
sent up this morning, nice damsons. We will also go
and make our oblations to Egeria, who has been a long time
deserted,”

Did Judge Morgridge, or Mr. Evelyn, send you these
plums?” asked Rose when they had gained their retreat.

“Cæsar said it was the Judge,” replied Margaret coloring.

“I thank you! I thank you! I love you Margaret,” said
Rose, and by a very unexpected gesticulation buried her face,
with apparent strong feeling in Margaret's lap.

[figure description] Page 288.[end figure description]

“Well done, Rose,” said Margaret, “you are lux inaccessa,
unapproachable, inexplicable. What is the meaning of this?
You are crushing my bonnet, you are staining yourself with the
plums.—I have exhausted myself in vain upon you, and have
failed to discover you at all, and now you flood me with
yourself!”

“Margaret!” said Rose regaining her position, “you are
angry with me! I have offended you! I can expect no more
from you. I will not inflict myself upon you.”

“Hold, Rose!” said Margaret laying her hand upon her
arm. “No one knows what I have felt and suffered for you.
I am not angry with you. In my heart I love you, and never
more than now. Why did you thank me?”

“For that blush when I asked you about the plums,” said
Rose.

“In good sooth,” replied Margaret, “your face is red as a
beet with the plums, now; and I doubt if you would thank me
for thanking you for it. Here is my handkerchief, wipe it off
and we shall be even.”

“Don't laugh at me, Margaret, if you do I can never speak
to you again. I have stains in my soul, Margaret, which cannot
be so easily effaced.”

“Tell me, Rose,” said Margaret, “what is this you speak
of?”

“When I saw the color in your face,” replied Rose, “it
seemed to me as if you possessed feelings which I never supposed
you to have, or you appeared in a light different from
ever before.”

“Surely,” said Margaret, “you need not have waited for
that, to know I have in my keeping a pretty considerable
variety of emotions, as many as there are speckled hens in our
roost.”

“I know,” rejoined Rose, “that you have been most kind
to me, a perfect angel, and the only one I ever expect to see,
but you were always happy you said, and you seemed so healthy
and strong; and a certain description of feeling I concluded
you were never troubled with. And even while Mr. Evelyn
was here you seemed on the whole quiet and undisturbed.
But I did see you weep on the hill, and I did see a tremulous
flush in your face, when I spoke about the plums—”

“And you do suppose I have some feelings of human nature
about me?”

“Yes, of a kind that would fit me; I had despaired to find
any, wholly such, in the world. You must needs have suffered

[figure description] Page 289.[end figure description]

some in your innermost soul, to feel with me, and that I supposed
you never had.”

“It is sympathy you want,” said Margaret.

“Yes, sympathy,” replied Rose, “that is it.”

“That word,” said Margaret, “Mr. Evelyn taught me. But
I hardly need wait for an instructor to tell me its meaning.”

“I knew you pitied me,” said Rose, “but I feared you did
not sympathise with me.”

“Well, now,” said Margaret, “perhaps after all I do not.
How do I know what to sympathise with?”

“If you will promise to sympathise, without knowing precisely
what with, I will tell you. Margaret!” continued Rose
solemnly, “do not I exhibit symptoms of a decline? Can I
live long? I do not wish to. Let me die. Let me sleep the
eternal sleep. But before I die, you shall know all I have to
tell.”

“I will see that you do not die, Rose, if you will only tell
what you are.”

“A broken-hearted girl, Margaret, that is all. Can you
sympathise with that?”

“I knew, dear Rose, something pierced and wounded you
inwardly, and by intimations of which I can give no account,
I have felt it all. It has been repeated in my own breast,
though I never spoke of it. Come where you need to be, into
my arms, Rose, and speak or be silent, as you best can. That
word broken-hearted is a strange word, I never heard it,
methinks, before. I have heard of puppet-hearts, and wicked
hearts, and hard hearts, but never till now, Rose, of a broken
heart.”

“A broken heart is all I boast of, and a poor thing it is,
and sad its story to me, perhaps to you foolish.”

“I have seen nothing foolish in you, Rose, only some things
that I could not understand, and some that made me very sad.
Do tell me all.”

“I am simply one,” said Rose, “who has pined for human
sympathy, a disease of which I am about to die, coupled with
a few other things. But let me tell you, you once asked my
name. I used to be called Rose Elphiston. I had a father,
a mother and a dear sister. My native town is Windenboro,
about thirty miles hence. My father was a clergyman, venerable
and esteemed. We were a very happy family, none could
be more so, until I ruined their happiness. Oh, Margaret,
you have no sins to cause you to shed tears, as I have—but
hear. I had companions, pretty and lively young girls, with

[figure description] Page 290.[end figure description]

whom I ought to have been content, but was not. No voice
spake what my heart felt, no eyes saw what mine did, so I
must needs be silent, and look where others did not, and then
I took to making company of brooks and flowers, and my own
thoughts; and such things. I thought I would give the universe
if I could find somebody's else heart beating into my
own, or somebody's else eyes looking through mine. I longed
for a twin existence; to divide and find myself in another.
My father and mother loved me, and my sister was always
kind to me, but she had not the same feelings that I had.
One day there was a donation party at our house. The ladies
of the town brought their wheels and spun quantities of flax,
which they gave to my mother; and the young men made an
ox-sled, which, with a yoke of oxen, they presented to Pa. A
merry time it was, and I enjoyed it with the rest. I could
even be very happy with my old mates. Among the young
men was a stranger in town, a gentleman from New York,
who was called Raxman. He contributed largely towards the
sled. He spoke to me in a manner different from the rest, he
was a great admirer of nature, and seemed in many things to
anticipate my own feelings. My thought, and I do not know
but I must say my affections, turned towards him with the
quickness of the needle to the pole. All at once I fancied that
in him my ideal was complete. But I am only telling you a
common love-story, Margaret.”

“It is all new and strange to me, Rose, do tell me everything.”

“But Raxman was base and unprincipled. I was horror-struck,
stupified at his conduct, I know not what, I must have
fainted and fallen, I only remember being borne into the house
of one of our town's folk; and then walking home. A crowd
of people met me in the way with taunts and hisses. I seemed
to lose my self-control, I became confused and maddened. I
did not answer my own parents coherently. I was summoned
before a magistrate, and condemned to stand in the pillory
with a rope on my neck, and have a significant red letter
sewed to my back. My father most earnestly interceded for
me, and only the latter part of the sentence was executed.
Raxman fled. There were a thousand rumors afloat about
him and me. He had money, good looks and some accomplishments,
and his company had been in considerable quest;
whether it was envy or morality, or what not, the people turned
most violently against him, and I came in for my share of censure.
I was reduced to a state bordering on distraction, I

[figure description] Page 291.[end figure description]

would make no confession, I repelled and scoffed at the whole
world. I tore the detested badge from my shoulders. I was
caught in the streets by my own playmates, I was carried to
women who had once loved me as a daughter, and by their
own hands was it replaced. My father interposing in my
behalf lost credit with the parish, old difficulties were renewed,
and by this head of opposition he was swept from his influence,
his salary and his pulpit. He died soon of that disease with
which his daughter will soon follow him, a broken heart. My
mother, always of a delicate constitution, enfeebled by the
excitement of the times, was not long behind my father, she
too died. My sister became insane. I alone watched by her
in her fearful ravings; I prayed that I might become insane
too. My old friends all deserted me, my sister at length took
the mood that I was her enemy, and I was obliged to leave
her; she was carried to the Poor-house. On me no door was
opened, to me no friendly face was turned. An example, they
said, must be made of the Parson's daughter, `her will must be
humbled;' `if she escapes, contamination will spread in all
our families.' I could not yield. All the energies of my
being rebelled. In addition, let me tell you, my father was
a believer in the doctrine of Election and Reprobation. What
he preached I found myself compelled to carry out in practice;
I believed myself thoroughly reprobated. In my earliest years
I was very thoughtful, it was said that I often experienced the
strivings of the Holy Spirit, I was under conviction three
months, and at last obtained a hope, and was admitted to the
Church—you do not understand these things, Margaret, your
education has been so different—”

“Only tell them, Rose, and I shall understand them.”

“I was not at ease; the first flush of youthful enthusiasm
was spent, and pious people no longer satisfied me; the singing
of hymns and going to Preparatory Lectures became
irksome. I sought in books and the woods what I did not
find in religion. My father's sermons, my mother's private
admonitions had no effect upon me. I found myself growing
hard as a rock to all serious impressions. Being negligent in
my Christian duties, I became the subject of Church accusation
and reprimand. I felt badly to be disgraced, I have wept
bitter tears when I thought of my mother's tears, but religious
considerations had not a tittle of weight with me. In this
situation I was when I encountered Raxman, on the one hand
yearning for an indefinite good, and most sensitive to all impressions
of beauty; on the other, reduced by a consciousness

[figure description] Page 292.[end figure description]

of religious dereliction, and wholly indifferent to the state of
my soul. The sequel of that acquaintance I have told you.
Disgraced, discarded, bereaved, I lost all self-equipoise, I
boiled over like an Iceland geyser, I recoiled upon myself with
such violence as seemed to rend me in tatters; with Job I
would have cursed God and died, I was alternately a hurricane
of passion and a Dead Sea of insensibility. I went to an
uncle's of mine, in a distant town, a kind-hearted man, who
sought, as he said, to bring me to repentance, and restore my
Christian peace, by an application of the truths of the Gospel.
I could not listen to him, I could not endure his family
prayers; I hated the God he invoked, I hated that name of
Christ, by which alone he said I could be saved. I knew of
a cousin of my mother, the Widow Wright, who had once
been at our house; I knew her temperament and habits, I
knew how secluded she lived, and thinking that I could at
least die with her, if not live, and that I could render myself
so useful my support would not be a burden, hither I came.
I learned of my sister's death before I left my uncle's. Here
you behold me, as I told you, a broken-hearted girl, a wreck,
a mutilation, a shadow!”

“Rose, poor Rose, dear Rose,” outspoke Margaret,
“come to my heart, lie down in my spirit, return to your
sorrow's home in my soul. A prophetic unconscious sensation
is fulfilled in you! An unknown aching correspondency of
feeling is satisfied! You shall be renewed in my arms, you
shall live in my love.”

“Oh Margaret!” replied Rose, “I am vile, I am sinful.
Your pureness appals me. Yet if I might but die, and be
buried here, it were all I should ask. The prayers of my
innocence I can utter no more, the dreams of my childhood
are fled, the happiness of youth is gone, the inner strength of
virtue I no more feel, on the face of Beauty I wish no more
to look, the bloom of nature is transformed to darkness and
dread, the voices of birds fill me only with remorse. Man and
woman I loathe, God is not. Yes, I have become an atheist,
I believe nothing, and at times I fear nothing.”

“Your sorrowful pathway, Rose, I am sure I have followed,
I have overtaken you to be only your own sad sister. Why
did you not speak of these things before?”

“Only, Margaret, because I wronged you. I felt that I
never could speak of myself to any one. Who could sympathise
with me! Who could bear the burden of my heart! But when
I knew that you too had suffered, when I saw your own heart

[figure description] Page 293.[end figure description]

innerly moved, I could no more restrain myself.—I am sometimes
light-hearted, or I should say light-headed, blithe and
free, and sometimes dejected beyond recovery or reason—all
this you have seen and wondered at.”

“I have seen it—yes—but Father Democritus I think will
explain it. `The spirits,' he says, `are subtil vapors expressed
from the blood,' and these coursing backwards and forwards
between the brain and the heart produce all sorts of feelings.
Besides, Rose, this melancholy of yours is not of the black
kind, but very white, and I think it may be cured. `Exercise,
' is recommended, `good air, music, gardening, swimming,
hunting, dancing, laughing,' all these we have. `Spoon
meat and pure water,' he says, are excellent; balm and annisseed
tea he says will drive away dumps and cheer the spirits,
and these your aunt the Widow will furnish. You never read
the Anatomy of Melancholy, it is a most wonderful book, and
will cure you immediately.”

“You are good, Margaret, if you do banter me. If I were
any body else but what I am, I should more than half
believe what you say to be true. That I can laugh you know,
that I love Chilion's music you also know. I would dance if
I had an opportunity. I used to think it a sin, but all qualms
of that sort are gone forever.”

“Eat some of the plums, Rose.”

“I will, for Mr. Evelyn's sake.”

“Eat them for my sake, for their own sake. You would
not see Mr. Evelyn!”

“No, I could see nobody but you. I was too, too much
ennuyée, too wicked.”

“Eat the plums, and perhaps I have a story to tell you,
of —”

“Mr. Evelyn?”

“No, but of somebody. I shall not tell you who, Mr.
Anonymous.”

“Really, Margaret, I am anxious to hear. What have you
to say? Where did you see him?”

“Here at the Pond, my story is not so long as yours, and I
will begin with what I know. Scarlet coat, white breeches,
Napoleon hat, sparkling black eyes, large black whiskers
meeting under his chin, like a muskrat.”

“Raxman!”

“Raxman! what do you mean?”

“It was he. A soft, pleasant voice?”

“Yes.”

[figure description] Page 294.[end figure description]

“Raxman; the very same.”

“I do remember his echoing your name in a strange way,
when I told him such an one was in the neighborhood.”

“I did not think of it at the time, but I can recollect a sort
of suspicion I have had that he was here. Obed told me of
his rencontre on the Head. But what with his fear and his
ardor, his perceptions were not very clear, and all he remembered
was the black whiskers. I have suspected too, that my
aunt knew of him, but she is a very queer woman, and I do
not pretend to sound her. Were you not afraid?”

“No more than I am of the cows, who are ever disposed to
yield the path, when I am ready to demand it; this I have
been trying to teach Isabel, who always runs from them.—
Obed's tempestuousness may have hastened his departure, but
it did not secure my safety. Indeed, he interrupted me sorely,
and I lost my patience. It was Court week you know, and I
supposed it was some lawyer, or other stranger in town; he
came two or three times, his manners, as Mrs. Beach would
say, were excellent. Yet I was perfectly alone even while he
was present, he was no company to my thought, and when at last
he broke in upon my solitude, by kneeling before me and saying
something about adoration, he so far recalled me to myself
and attracted my attention, that I cried out at the intrusion.”

“And so you wonder,” said Rose, “that my name and his
should ever be brought together, that I could have been drawn
towards him. You will blame me, more than you pity me.”

“Why should I blame you?”

“For loving Raxman.”

“Ought I not to honor you for that? What else, as a Christian
could you do, if he were the pitiful wretch you describe?”

“Death and forever, Margaret! Don't you know I am no
Christian, that I abhor and eschew the name; you know I mean
something different from such an affection.”

“What do you mean?”

“An absorbing concentration on some one object, an intense
movement to a single point, a gravitation of your whole
being around a solitary centre.”

“Is that what you mean by love?”

“Yes. You think of nothing else, dream of nothing else,
care for nothing else, as you do for that one object.”

“And all this you felt for Raxman?”

“No, no, no! I wanted to feel it for some one. I wanted
some Infinite to come and take up my soul, and he, a Devil,
disguised as an Angel of Light, appeared and deluded me. I

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cannot tell all I felt for him, it was something, it was too much,
but it was not that. His dress or looks did not captivate me.
He did express a sort of sympathy for my tastes, and my solitariness.—
He made no impression on you, and me he affected
deeply!”

“How shall I blame you for that? What you now tell me,
Rose, is new, anagogic, mysterious—”

“Wholly so?—Nay, tell me, Margaret.”

“How urgent you are, Rose!”

“Is there no oneness, no individuality, to all you feel or ever
have felt?”

“I love Chilion, and Isabel, and Job, and Rose.”

“Nothing more?”

“Christ.”

“You torture me. I told you not to mention that name
again. I mean a man.”

“Not a woman?”

“Yes, a woman either, if you will have it so.”

“Mr. Evelyn?”

“Yes, Mr. Evelyn.”

“Mr. Evelyn!”

“You echo the name as if it had no place in your heart, but
only in your speculation.”

“Mr. Evelyn.”