Lionel Granby.
CHAP. IV.
She like a solitary rose that springs
In the first warmth of summer days, and flings
A perfume the more sweet because alone
Just bursting into beauty, with a zone—
Half girl's—half woman's.—Marcian Colonna.
The gentle ease, and simple tranquillity which reigned at Chalgrave, found me its most obedient vassal. I lounged in the library the whole day, devouring with a morbid appetite, romance, poetry, and light fantasy. I shunned the gay circle of its inmates, not through misanthropy or boyish modesty, but from an utter contempt of the form and spirit of social intercourse. I communed alone with myself, and in the wanton dreams which a sickly fancy conjured before me, I was alternately the victim of caprice, restlessness, and disquietude. Though secluded I was not solitary—though a hermit I was not a misanthrope. Arthur Ludwell was a little nucleus, about whom the affections and friendships of the whole household gathered themselves. His occasional visits to the library—his frank and open address, and his serious and manly sense, all conspired to teach me the value of his usefulness, and the degradation of my own worthlessness. He could laugh at my sentimental reveries, yet he had a deep and chastened taste for poetry; and though he was in the full tide of elastic youth, he could read me a homily on the errors of an ill regulated mind, with all the grave solemnity of referend age. His expostulations—the remonstrances of my mother, and the broad hints about bad breeding which the old dining-room servant gave me, could not seduce me from my much loved retreat. I adhered to its fascinations even as the ivy to the falling tower, and was simple enough to believe that wisdom was gained by the bopeep game between reason, fancy and folly.
One morning while I was engaged in my usual speculations, the door of the library was suddenly opened, and Lucy entered, exclaiming! "Your cousin Isa has arrived; shut your books! and do, my dear Lionel, arrange your disordered dress. Look at your dishevelled hair. 'Twill curl in graceful ringlets! and now do take it away from your pale and melancholy brow." Twining her fingers in my hair, "I declare," cried she, "I will not leave you till you come into the parlor. Isa is a lovely girl, and is now receiving the affectionate salutations of the whole family. Do, for my sake! for our mother's! and for the character of the name you bear, grant my request." I could not hesitate, when she impressed her entreaty with a kiss; and promising that I would appear before my cousin, I soon commenced the unusual labors of my toilette. I felt a wish, from some unaccountable emotion, to impress my cousin with my appearance, and went into my toilette as a warrior into an armory. Scipio's countenance was lit up with joy, when I summoned his assistance; and with much deference he ventured to hope that I would now let the old books rest—that I would sometimes sail in our pleasure boat—that I would look at the Janus colts—that I would let him go with me to our old walks, and that we would be boys again.
So soon as I had descended into the parlor, my mother advancing towards me, led me to a recess in the dormant window; and with much solemnity introduced me in due form to my cousin Isa Gordon! My fair relative was much abashed at the gravity of my introduction, and something like fear checked the furtive glance which was beaming over her countenance. For my own part I was confused, alarmed, and agitated, and trembled beneath that silent eloquence, and impassioned sympathy, which in making woman lovely, ever makes man a fool. To me the situation was painful and singular, for I had never before quailed under the smiles or frowns of female society. I had gained their contempt by apathy; and studiously avoiding the little attentions demanded by the honor of gallantry, I stood among them a heartless being, whose company was tolerated only because his satire was dangerous.
"I am truly happy to see you at Chalgrave," were the first words which were stammered through my confusion!
She blushed more deeply when I had spoken, and was hesitating a reply, when Lucy advancing relieved her from her embarrassment. At the call of my mother they moved across the room, and I was left gazing in mute rapture, at the grace and sylph-like gentleness, which characterized the footsteps of my cousin.
This was Isa Gordon! that morning star which still shines on with purity and brightness over the dark horizon of memory, and which even now pours its bold and mellow light over the dreary waste of my affections. Though not of tall stature, her form was one of exquisite grace and symmetry, and her beauty mingled itself with the eye and memory of the beholder. Her golden locks relieved a blushing cheek, where laughing summer had set its seal, while her countenance expressed a sensibility, intelligence, sweetness of temper and innocence which disarmed flattery, and kindled affection. She was grave more from gentle thoughtfulness than melancholy; and the low, rich and soft music of her voice, stole upon the heart like the swelling cadence of the Æolian harp. To firmness she united delicacy of character, and possessing softness without weakness, humility without arrogance, and beauty without affectation, her life became a rare and happy combination of dignity, elevation and gentleness, with the virtues which ennoble man, and the winning graces which endear woman. She was in all the pride and power of conquering seventeen, yet still no girlishness weakened the unobtrusive dignity of her character. Romance might have decked her with all the gorgeous hues of its fond imaginings. Poetry might have lingered around the silent purity of her life, but reason alone could truly love—and wisdom adore her.
On that day I felt a new passion adding itself to my dreamy solitude; and when I returned to my tranquil room, I found myself the victim of wild and impassioned love, betraying every symptom of its curious and wayward power. I was alternately humble and arrogant—stubborn and infirm—now a gallant cavalier, winning woman's heart by martial prowess—now a finished coxcomb with a plentiful store of that harmless folly which is frittered away from common sense, and now a rhyme stricken poet, drawing inspiration from my own distempered vanity, and struggling for metre in the odds and ends of language. I loved with a holy and fervent ardor; yet the purity which I fondly believed was the characteristic of my passion, was stained into grossness by individual pride. Self love made me a little deity, and woman's regard was an offering demanded by my insatiate egotism. I do not know that I erred more than most young lovers, in thus reasoning from the cause to the effect, and in believing that the existence of love arises solely from our own latent merits and fascinations. Kindness makes us arrogant, while pride deduces from a blush or a smile, positive evidence of woman's unhesitating love. If she reason with the folly of our passion, she is cold—if she shew the least sunshine of tenderness, she is indelicate, and if she exercise the common prudence of a reasoning being, she is a coquette. Man must have all the constancy of her love, all the devotion of her guileless heart, and he alone must mould its delicate texture to the wanton caprice of his own vanity. He grants her all that love which he can spare from the faction and turmoil of the world, and demands in return her esteem for his errors, and her adoration for his infirmities. We treat them as fools, when we breathe our false and treacherous love, and thus cheat ourselves into a belief of our own purity and truth. A woman of dignity will smile at the fantastic tricks which duplicity enacts before her; and if she truly love she will crush our pride by coldness, and blind the searching eye of our vanity by indifference. She risks her total happiness—she nobly throws all her treasured hopes into the scale of marriage, and when once resolved, she hesitates no longer over the trembling sacrifice of her implicit confidence. Man calls the considerations of her judgment insincerity—and the justifiable warfare of defence—coquetry. He loves from pride; while prudence teaches her to inspire him with that true passion, which takes its brightness like the diamond, only from the attrition of its own fragments.
Excited by the influence of my new passion, I became a being of different habits, and boldly entered into the spirit of that social circle whose gaiety I had shunned. The rays of love had beamed athwart the darkness of my solitude, and I basked in their brilliancy till seclusion lost its philosophy and study its excitement. I was happy only in the company of Isa Gordon, and revelled like a martyr, in the funereal pyre, which consumed my tranquillity. With the quick penetration of her sex she perceived my love, and though it hourly disported its vagaries before her, it failed to move either her serenity of temper, or unbend her dignity of character. In her intercourse with me she was courteous, kind and polite, and I vainly labored to find some of those thousand signs of reciprocal attachment with which egotism flatters pride, and with which vanity sustains folly. I thought she was cold and heartless, and have often gazed on her beauty with that chilled rapture which would dwell on the rainbow that lends its glittering canopy to the brow of the glacier.
Time wore away on downy feet, and the period was rapidly approaching when Isa was to leave Chalgrave, and I was to enter college. I dared not breathe my love; for though blinded by excess of passion, I had enough of reason to know that I should be rejected; but could she refuse when I plainly declared my sentiments? My vanity whispered her acceptance, and I believed that her indifference proceeded not from dislike but from my silence on that necessary and important declaration which the pride and pretended ignorance of every woman imperiously demands.
"You are singularly romantic, Lionel!" said she, as I was earnestly employed in repeating some wild stanzas which I had inscribed to the evening star! "What a curious conceit to make it the bridal torch of the moon, and why people it with the genius of light. Many a poet has sighed away his sense in searching for metaphors to exalt it—yet it still shines on, careless of the poor folly which labors to adorn it." "There is destiny in it, Isa! and even now as it arrests your gaze, does it not tell thee of futurity? and does it not give a dreamy melancholy—an incoherent imagining to thy young, thy cold, thy uncorrupted heart?"
"My heart cold!" replied she, smiling, "What a happy poet! In one moment basking in the light of the evening star, and in the next ungenerously censuring a heart of which you know nothing."
"I do know it! I know that you have chilled its better feelings by the dictates of reason, and from long obedience to stern prudence, you cannot, dare not love! You have seen the sincerity of my passion, and you have trampled on the purity of that love which adores you! Hear me, dear Isa," I continued, seizing her hand and arresting her departure, "hear my unworthy love. I am a wretched, desolate being, and live alone."
"Lionel!" said she, suddenly interrupting me, "I do not love you! You have noble qualities, and a genius which promises the highest distinctions of fame. Forget your idle passion, and be assured that I shall ever retain for you the most affectionate friendship. Enter into the busy throng of the world, and you will quickly gain that chastened wisdom which can laugh to scorn all your boyish dreams of romance, and in the race of ambition you must and will forget your fancied sorrows. Is it not true that
'Love seldom haunts the breast where learning lies
And Venus sets—ere Mercury can rise.'"
"I did not reckon on insult," I replied with much temper, "nor did I wish you to read me a homily on the extravagance of that passion which you alone have caused. You may scorn, yet I can love."
Lucy, accompanied by Arthur Ludwell, appeared at this moment, and relieved me from a scene of distress, confusion, and embarrassment. They returned with Isa to the parlor; and I, in a state of tempestuous feeling and subdued pride, sauntered to the shores of the Chesapeake. A whip-poor-will seated on the leafless branch of a ruined oak, was carolling his funereal notes to the responsive echoes of the forest. The moon was rising far in the East, and the broad sea before me had already flushed its rippled surface in her mellow light. Here and there in the fretted horizon, might be dimly discovered the diminished sail, or the frail bark of the silent fisherman. All nature was slumbering in deathlike solitude, while I alone was the rude string whose vibrations jarred into discord the peaceful scene around me. In the bitterness of wounded pride I solemnly resolved to conquer my unrequited passion. I returned to Chalgrave, proud, stubborn and unconquerable. I looked up to its dreary grandeur and my eye caught the light form of Isa flitting athwart a window. My obstinacy vanished like the mist of the morning, and I was again the creature of love, hope, and imagination.
On the succeeding day she quitted Chalgrave. Her parting interview was simple and affecting. A kiss for my mother—a tear for Lucy, and a smile for me, were the little legacies her affections bequeathed. With strained eye and intense interest, I watched the chariot which bore her away, and when it had sunk into the forest, I turned off to meditate on her virtues and dream on her beauty. My old nurse gently touching me, placed in my hand a little packet which she said Miss Isa had left for me. I tore off the envelope, and a golden locket fell at my feet, on which was inscribed in faint though legible lines, "Dinna forget." That momento is now on my heart—a holy relic of the wreck of my happiness.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.
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