There are seldom allotted to humanity fourteen
years of such success and happiness as had been
experienced by the Barclays. In this time, Mr.
Barclay had secured a competency. His competency
did not merit the well-known satirical definition
of being a “little more than a man has,”
but was enough to satisfy his well regulated desires,
to provide for the education of his children,
and to save his daughters from the temptation of
securing a home, in that most wretched of all
modes, by marrying for it. It was no part of his
plan to provide property for his sons. Good characters,
good education, and a start in the world,
was all they were to expect. This they perfectly
understood. As soon as they were capable of
comprehending them, they were made acquainted
with their father's affairs, minutely informed of
the condition of his property, and his plans for the

[figure description] Page 076.[end figure description]

future. Mr. Barclay despised that mean jealousy
with which some parents hide their pecuniary
affairs from their children, — some husbands from
their wives even, as if they were not joint and
equal proprietors in the concern.

He had now nearly reached the period when
he mediated a great change in his life. From
the beginning of his career in the city, he had
looked forward with a yearning heart to the time
when he might retire to Greenbrook. His children
often visited their relatives there. It was
their Jerusalem, to which the heart made all its
pilgrimages. The old parsonage had recently
come into market; Mr. Barclay had purchased it;
and it was a fixed matter, that in the ensuing
spring, as soon as the house could be repaired,
the family should remove thither. In the mean
time, this long hoped-for event was the constant
theme of father, mother, and children. Improvements
and occupations were planned by day, and
at night Mr. Barclay's dreams were of that home
of his childhood. Again he was wading and
swimming in that prettiest of all streams that circled
the meadows, slaking his thirst from the
moss-grown bucket, and making cups and saucers
for little Anne Hyde from the acorns under the
great oak tree at the end of the lane.

Alas! disappointment comes to the most prudent,
when least expected and often when least
deserved.

It was just before Christmas, about the annual
period when business is investigated and its results
ascertained. Mr. Barclay had been shut up

[figure description] Page 077.[end figure description]

all the morning in his counting-room with his elder
partner, Norton. Their accounts stood fairly,
and showed a prosperous business and great increase
of profits. The old man did not seem at all
animated by this happy state of things. He was
absent and thoughtful, and nothing roused him
till Mr. Barclay said, “I do not believe you will
ever regret taking my advice and putting Harry
into the printing-office.”

“Never, never,” repeated Norton emphatically.

“I should not be surprised,” continued Mr.
Barclay, “if he were in the end richer than his
brother, and I am sure he will not be less happy,
nor less respectable.”

A half-suppressed groan escaped Norton.

“You are not well, sir?”

“No, I am not well, — I have not been well
for a long time, — I never expect to be again.”

“O, sir, you are needlessly alarmed.”

“No, no; I am not alarmed, — not alarmed
about my health.”

“You have worked too hard this morning.
You will feel better for the fresh air; I will walk
home with you.”

The fresh air did not minister to the mind diseased.
Norton's depression continued during
the walk. He said little, and that little in broken
sentences, in praise of his son Harry. “He is an
honest boy, Barclay, — good principles, — good
habits, — owes them all to you, — he 'll be able to
shift for himself, if—he 's a good boy, Barclay.”

When they reached Norton's fine residence in
Hudson Square, his daughter Emily, a child of

[figure description] Page 078.[end figure description]

eleven or twelve, met them at the door, exclaiming,
“O, papa, the men have hung the lamps, and
brought the flowers, and the rooms look beautifully!”

In her eagerness she did not at first give any
heed to Mr. Barclay's presence; but when she did,
she nodded to him, stammered through the last
half of her sentence, turned on her heel, and
briskly ran through the entry and up stairs. Norton
was roused, his energy was excited by what
he deemed a necessary exertion, and he begged
Mr. Barclay to enter, saying he had a word to say
to him in private. Mr. Barclay followed him into
one of his two fine drawing-rooms; the foldingdoors
were open, and both were furnished in a
style that becomes the houses of our wealthiest
merchants. The apartments were obviously in
preparation for a party. The servants were going
to and fro with the most bustling and important
air. Norton looked round with a melancholy
gaze, and then asked Mr. Barclay to follow him to
a small breakfasting-room. He shut the door,
and, after a little moving of the chairs and hemming,
he said, “We are to have a great party
this evening, Barclay.”

“So I perceive, sir.”

“It is a party that John's wife gives for Emily.”

“Indeed!”

“It an't my fault, Barclay, nor Harry's, —
Heaven knows; nor can it be called Em's, — poor
child! these foolish notions are put in her head;
but it is John's wife's fault, — and John's too, I
must own, that your folks are not asked.”

[figure description] Page 079.[end figure description]

“My dear sir, do not give yourself a moment's
uneasiness about it. It would be no kindness to
my family to invite them; they know none of
Mrs. John Norton's friends, and these fine parties
are not at all in our way.”

“It is the better for you, — it is all cursed folly, —
I see it too late.”

Mr. Barclay responded mentally and most heartily,
“Amen,” and was going away, when Norton
laid his hand on his arm, saying, “Don't blame
Harry; he is good and true, — he is your own
boy, you've made him all he is; don't blame
him.”

“I assure you I blame no one, my good
friend,” said Mr. Barclay, and hurried home,
thinking a great deal of Norton's dejection, but
not again of the party, till, in the evening, Harry
Norton joined his family circle as usual, and stayed
till bed-time; but was not, as usual, cheerful and
sociable.

The elder Norton was an uneducated man.
He spent all his early life in toiling in a lean business,
and accumulating in consequence of his
very frugal house-keeping, his small gains. When
Mr. Barclay threw his talent into the concern, it
at once became thriving; and when John Norton,
whose education his ignorant father had
been quite incapable of directing, was of a marriageable
age, he was reputed the son of a rich
man. Being ambitious of a fashionable currency,
he succeeded in marrying a poor stylish girl, who
immediately introduced her notions of high life
into her father-in-law's house, and easily induced

[figure description] Page 080.[end figure description]

the weak old man to fall into her plan of setting
up a genteel establishment, and living fashionably;
“weakly imitating” (as has been pithily
said) “what is weakest abroad.” Old Norton
had but three children; two by a second marriage.
Harry was in firm hands, and easily managed,
but poor little Emily was removed from all
her old associates, sent to a French school, and
fairly inducted into a genteel circle.

The party was over, and a beautiful Christmas
morning followed. Mrs. Barclay was in her nursery
and Mr. Barclay still in his room, where he
had already received the greetings of his children
as they passed down stairs; “A merry
Christmas, father!” and “The next at Greenbrook,
and O how merry it will be!”

Another and hurried tap at the door, and
“May I come in, sir?”

“Yes, Harry, come in. Mercy on us! what
is the matter, my boy?”

Harry Norton was pale and breathless; he
burst into tears, and almost choking, exclaimed,
“John has killed himself!”

“Your brother! — John! — God forbid!”

“Indeed he has, sir, and that is not the worst
of it.”

“What can there be worse?”

“O, Mr. Barclay!” replied the poor lad, covering
his burning cheeks with both hands, “I
cannot bear to tell.”

What Harry in a broken voice, and tears poured
out like rain for the shame of another, told, was
briefly as follows. John, without education for

[figure description] Page 081.[end figure description]

business and without any capital of his own, had
engaged largely in mercantile concerns, and had
plunged deeply into that species of gaming called
speculation. His affairs took a disastrous turn,
and after his credit was exhausted, his paper was
accepted by virtue of the endorsement of Norton
and Co., which he obtained from his weak father
without the concurrence or knowledge of Mr.
Barclay. A crisis came. The old man refused
any farther assistance. John committed a fraud,
and, when soon after he perceived that detection
and ruin were inevitable, he resolved on self-murder.
He spent an hour or two at his wife's
Christmas-eve party, talked and laughed louder
than any body else, drank immeasurably of champagne,
and retired to the City Hotel to finish
the tragedy by the last horrid act. Thus, poor
wretch, did he shrink from the eye of man, to
rush into His presence, with whom the great account
of an outraged nature and a misspent life
was to be settled.

His family were roused from their beds to hear
the horrible news. The old man's health had
long been undermined in consequence of his
anxiety about his son's affairs, and the reproaches
of his conscience for the secret wrong he had
done his partner. The shock was too much for
him. It brought on nervous convulsions. At
the first interval of reason he sent for Mr. Barclay.
Mr. Barclay hastened to him with poor Harry,
who looked more like the guilty, than like the innocent
victim of the guilt of another.

[figure description] Page 082.[end figure description]

Reflections swarmed in Mr. Barclay's mind, as
he passed to the dying man's room through the
luxurious apartments where pleasure, so called,
had, through the demands of waste and extravagance,
led to the fatal issue. Some of the lamps
were still burning, or smoking in their sockets.
He passed the open door of the supper-room.
There still stood the relics of the feast, — fragments
of perigord pies, drooping flowers, broken
pyramids, and piles — literally piles — of empty
champagne bottles; an enormous whiskey-punch
bowl, drained to the last drop, stood in a niche in
the entry.[2] The door of Mrs. Norton's apartment
was open, — she in hysterics on the sofa,
her attendants running in and out, their minds
divided between the curiosity ever awake on such
occasions and the wants of the weak sufferer.
When at last Mr. Barclay reached the old man's
apartment in the third story, he found him bolstered
up in his bed, breathing painfully. When
he saw Mr. Barclay enter, followed by Harry, a
slight shivering passed over his frame. He
stretched out his arm and closed his eyes; Mr.
Barclay took his hand. Norton felt that there
was no longer time for delay or concealment.
He attempted to speak, but his organs were now
weaker than his mind. After several futile efforts,
his quivering lips uttered the words, “I have —

[figure description] Page 083.[end figure description]

much to tell you, — John — I — John — O, I
cannot!”

“You need not, sir; Harry has told me.”

Norton turned his eager eye to his son. The
blood that seemed to be congealed at his heart,
once more flushed to his cheek. “All, Harry?”
he asked in a husky voice.

“Yes, sir; Mr. Barclay knows all that we
know.”

Norton's eye again explored Mr. Barclay's face.
No reproach was there, — not even a struggling
and repressed displeasure, — nothing but forgiveness
and pity. The poor man understood it, and
felt it to his heart's core. He was past tears, but
the veins of his forehead swelled, his features were
convulsed, and he said in a broken voice, “O how
kind! but I can't forgive myself; — poor John!—
he 's past it! I'm going, and I can't — I can't
even ask God to — forgive me.”

“My dear friend! do not say so, — God is infinitely
more merciful than any of his creatures.
He pitieth us, even as a father pitieth his children.”

These words seemed to the poor man's spirit
like water to parched lips. He looked at his
son, and then at his little daughter, Emily, who
was kneeling behind the bed with her face buried
in the bed-clothes, and he realized in the gushing
tenderness of his own parental feelings the full
worth of that benignant assurance, which has
raised up so many desponding hearts. “Can you—
will you pray for me?” he asked.

“Most certainly I will.”

“But now I mean, — aloud, so that I can hear
you.”

[figure description] Page 084.[end figure description]

Mr. Barclay knelt at the bedside. Harry
threw himself down by his sister, and put his
arm around her. Her moanings ceased while
their friend, in a low, calm voice, uttered his petitions
for their dying father. It was no time
for disguise or false coloring of any sort. Mr.
Norton had lived, as many live, believing in the
Bible and professing faith in Christ, but making
a very imperfect and insufficient application of
the precepts of Christianity to his life. In the
main, he was a moral, kind-hearted, and well-intentioned
man; but, misled by a silly ambition
and an overweening fondness for a favorite son,
he had destroyed him, deprived his younger children
of their rights, and defrauded his best
friend.

Mr. Barclay, in the name of the dying man,
expressed his contrition for the evil he had done,
and suffered to be done; — for the barrenness of
his life compared to the fruits it should have
produced. He acknowledged the equity of that
law which deprived him of the peace of the righteous
in his death. And then, even with tears,
he besought the compassion that faileth not, the
mercy promised by Jesus Christ and manifested
to many who had backslidden and sinned grievously,
but who, like the prodigal son, had returned
and been received with outstretched arms.
In conclusion, he alluded to himself. He fervently
thanked God, that when he had come from
the home of his fathers, a stranger to a strange
city, he had been received, befriended, and generously
aided by his departing servant; and he

[figure description] Page 085.[end figure description]

finished with a supplication that he might be heartily
disposed, and enabled, to return to the children
the favors received from the father.

Silence prevailed long after he ceased to
speak. Harry and Emily were locked in one another's
arms. Mr. Norton continued in fervent
prayer. His eyes were raised and his hands
folded. His spirit was at the foot of the cross,
seeking peace in the forgiveness and infinite compassion
there most manifest. When the old
man's mental prayer was finished, there was comparatively
peace on his countenance; but the
spirit that struggles back over those self-erected
barriers that have separated it from God, cannot
have, — must not expect, — the tranquillity, the
celestial joy, that is manifested in the death of
those who have been faithful in life.

Mr. Norton murmured his thoughts in half
formed sentences: “He is merciful; — `Come
unto me' — I am heavy laden. — Harry is very
good! — O — O, how good you are to me. — Poor
Emy, — she won't have to go to the alms-house,—
will she?”

Mr. Barclay turned his eye to the poor child,
and for the first time noticed her dress. She had
been wearied out with the party of the previous
evening, and had fallen asleep without undressing;
and now her ornamented pink silk frock, her rich
necklace and ear-rings were a painful comment
on her father's words. “Such a dress on a poor
child who has no certain refuge but the alms-house!”
thought Mr. Barclay. He felt the deepest
pity for her, but he was too honest to

p343-098 [figure description] Page 086.[end figure description]

authorize false hopes. “No,” he said in reply to Mr.
Norton, “Emily shall not go to the alms-house, —
she shall not be a dependent on any charity, public
or private, if she is true to herself. I will see
that she is qualified to earn her own living.”

“O, that is best, far best, — you 'll see to her,—
that 's enough, — and poor Harry too?”

“Harry already earns his living. I will be his
guardian Shall I, Harry?”

“You always have been, sir,” replied Harry,
grasping his hand.

“Yes, yes, — he has; — God reward him, —
he, not I.”

“O, father, I did not mean that, — indeed I
did not.”

“Truth don't hurt me now,” said the old man;
“it 's truth.” And so it was.

eaf343.n2

[2] The writer was told by a lady, that after a party at
her house where one of these mammoth punch-bowls
had been nearly emptied, she offered a glass of the beverage
to a servant; “No, I thank you, madam,” he replied,
“I belong to the Temperance Society.” What a
satire!