Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth

“ Can you breathe the breath of life again into the cold bosom of the dead mother that lies in yonder chamber? Can you cause that stilled heart to beat? those closed eyes to open? those silent lips to speak and murmur softly, “My little Margaret, my dove?” In a word, can you raise the dead to life? If not, then go, and trouble her not with your commonplaces. Before the image of an only child, just orphaned of her mother, that merely human comforter who best comprehends her sorrow would stand the most confounded—dumb. Leave her to God. Only He who wounds can heal. ”

“ To no one but to me, Traverse, to me whose anxiety for your happiness makes me watchful; and now, dear boy, you must listen to me. I know it is very sweet to you, to sit in a dark corner and gaze on Clara, when no one, not even herself, witnesses your joy, and to lie awake and think and dream of her when no eye but that of God looks down upon your heart; and to build castles in the air for her and for you; all this I know is very sweet, but, Traverse, it is a sweet poison—fatal if indulged in—fatal to your peace and integrity. ”

“ You will dwell in lordly mansions, yet their magnificence will oppress you with the consciousness that they belong in justice to another. You will be arrayed in costly garments, yet you will be scarcely able to bear the glare of their splendor, for you will know they cover a woman degraded from her pristine nobility by base ambition, and stained with foul injustice. You will be adorned with priceless gems, yet the diamond tiara on your brow will burn and sear your brain like a diadem of flame; the diamond necklace on your bosom will scorch and eat into your heart like a circlet of fire. ”

“ THE GUERRILLA’S WIFE.
Danger, long travel, want and woe,
Soon change the form that best we know;
For deadly fear can time outgo,
And blanch at once the hair;
Hard time can roughen form and face,
And what can quench the eye’s bright grace,
Nor does old age a wrinkle trace
More deeply than despair.—Scott. Erminie grieved bitterly over the departure of her brother; yet she, no more than Britomarte, would have kept him back even if she could have done so. But she wept and prayed through the whole of the succeeding night. ”

“ Oh, Malcolm! try—try hard to save me from this fate! Oh! do not think that I am a coward, Malcolm! It is not death I fear. I should not dread dying in my bed with some devoted friend beside me, as sweet Agatha died! But to be hung! to die a violent, struggling, shameful death, with all the people looking at me!—oh! for Heaven’s sake, Malcolm, save me from such maddening horror!”
“Eudora! child! love! it is not necessary for you to urge me so earnestly. I would give my body to be burned if that would save you! and all that human power can accomplish shall be tried to deliver you. ”

“ I am one, who, for my soul’s great passion, will do, or dare, or suffer anything! I ask no leave of earth or Heaven for what I do! I do what I will, or can, and take the consequences; earth or Heaven can but punish, and I can risk or bear it!—for there is no pain or loss in the universe that I weigh with the loss of my love! And not for the fear of eternal perdition—not for the hope of everlasting salvation, will I forego the joy of my mortal love! ”

“ I believed myself the dupe of a clever adventuress, and my love was nipped in the bud. If I could believe otherwise now,—if I could believe that she was innocent in that affair, and that she has loved me all these years, and been true to that love, and is ready and willing to forgive and forget the long, sorrowful past,—Ishmael, instead of being the most desolate, I should be the most contented man alive. I should feel like a shipwrecked sailor, long tossed about on the stormy sea, arriving safe at home at last!" said Mr. Brudenell, gazing most longingly upon the picture he held in his hand. ”

“ I cannot escape it! I have bound my soul by a fearful oath! I cannot evade it! I shall not survive it! Oh, all the heaven is black with doom, and all the earth tainted with blood!" cried Miriam, wildly.
"You are insane, poor girl! you are insane!" said Thurston, pityingly.
"Would Heaven I were! would Heaven I were! but I am not! I am not! Too well I remember I have bound my soul by an oath to seek out Marian's destroyer, and deliver him up to death! And I must do it! I must do it! though my heart break—as it will break in the act!"
"And you believe me to be guilty of this awful crime!" ”

“ And our relations towards each other seem to me dearer, sweeter, more sacred even, than those of most other married couples! No, my own Sybil! Soul of my soul! there is no woman that I ever did, or ever could prefer to you!” And he drew her to his bosom, and pressed her there in all good faith and true love. And his grave and tender rebuke did even more to tranquilize her jealousy than all his caresses had done.
“I know it! I know it, my dear husband! But it is only when I feel how imperfect, how unworthy of you, I am, that I ever have doubts!” ”

“ Poor Rose! In infancy, from the day of her father's death, an unloved, neglected, persecuted child; in childhood, driven to desperation and elopement by the miseries of her home; in girlhood, deceived and abandoned by her lover; now, in womanhood, as friendless and unhappy as if she had not married a wealthy man, and was not living in a luxurious home. Poor Rose! She had lost her sense of honor, or she never would have married Mr. Rockharrt, even for a refuge. ”

“ When Sybil recovered from her death-like swoon, she felt herself being borne slowly on through what seemed a narrow, tortuous underground passage; but the utter darkness, relieved only by a little gleaming red taper that moved like a star before her, prevented her from seeing more.
A presentiment of impending destruction possessed her, and overwhelming horror filled her soul and held her faculties. Though her life had depended upon her speech, she could not have uttered a syllable. And no word was breathed by the mysterious beings who bore her on. Dumb as mutes at a funeral, they marched. ”

“ Oh, Major Hewitt, you know me, sir! You have known me from childhood! Your dear lady knew me, too, and was very kind to the poor quadroon boy, when he was a child. And you know my poor little Fannie, too! Sir, my heart is breaking—that is nothing, but she is dying! Sir, my wife is dying, alone—not of the fever only, but of starvation, of thirst, of neglect, of bereavement of all aid; and she sends to me, sir—sends to pray me to come and see her poor face for the last time, and take her orphan baby from her dead arms, lest it die, too! ”

“ There are moments when the most rational have wild hopes, moments when the most habitually self-collected doubt the evidence of their own senses; it was thus in amaze that they gazed upon her countenance, seemingly instinct with life; with the freshness, and fullness, and bloom of life; the color seemed brightening upon her cheeks and lips with life; the eyelashes and the amber ringlets seemed quivering with life, and even as they gazed with amaze the view was obscured by a mist on the glass, and the beautiful countenance veiled from their eyes. Elsie spoke with a voice full of tears. ”

“ And she thought of their future; it might bring toil, privation, penury, disappointment, and death, but it could not deprive her of the jewel of her soul, LOVE. That word—that idea—was still the centre of her soul’s circle, around which thought and feeling still revolved. She sank into a dim, delicious reverie, and, wrapped in blissful dreams, the world around her disappeared. The cheerful chirp of the crickets and the katydids was no longer heard—the deep blue, starlit sky no longer watched—the dark, mysterious forest, with its ever untrodden depths, no longer seen. ”

“ The gloomiest forebodings darkened the mind of Archer Clifton. There was one scene ever present to his mental vision—where, at the end of her dreadful journey, fainting from incredible exertion, Catherine had fallen into his arms, and he had received her with a harsh and stern rebuke for making a scene:—one look and tone of hers, that filled his soul with remorse and terror prophetic of doom—her last despairing gaze—her last despairing tones, before she sank into insensibility. ”

“ Thrown down on the mat at the back of the tent lay Traverse Rocke, pale, haggard and sunken in the deep, deep sleep of utter exhaustion. Even in that state of perfect abandonment, prostration and insensibility, the expression of great mental anguish remained upon his deathly countenance; a mortal pallor overspread his face; his thick, black curls, matted with perspiration, clung to his hollow temples and cheeks; great drops of sweat beaded upon his corrugated brow; a quiver convulsed his mouth and chin; every circumstance betrayed how severely, even in that swoon-like state, he suffered. ”

“ Nothing could have made me happier, than has your betrothal to so admirable a young man as the Marquis of Arondelle. Had I possessed the privilege of choosing a husband for you, and a son-in-law for myself, from the whole race of mankind, I should have chosen him above all others. But, my dearest Salome, the satisfaction I enjoy in your prospects of happiness is shadowed by one faint cloud. It is not much, my love; it is only the consciousness of my age and of the precarious state of my health. I may not live to see you united to the noble husband of your choice. ”

“ You are the fortune hunters and maneuverers! It is the fortune of the wealthy heiress and friendless orphan that you are in pursuit of! But that fortune, like my hand and heart, is already promised to one I love; and, to speak very plainly to you, I would die ere I would disappoint him or wed your son," said Clara, with invincible firmness.
"Die, girl! There are worse things than death in the world!" said Colonel Le Noir, with a threatening glare.
"I know it! and one of the worst things in the world would be a union with a man I could neither esteem nor even endure!" exclaimed Clara. ”

“ Then all the women except Sybil held their breath in awe.
It was indeed an awful pass! a road roughly hewn through the bottom of a deep, narrow, tortuous cleft in the mountains where, at some remote period, by some tremendous convulsions of nature, the solid rocks had been rent apart, leaving the ragged edges of the wound hanging at a dizzy height between heaven and earth! The dark iron-gray precipices that towered on each side were clothed in every cleft, from base to summit, with clumps of dark stunted evergreens as sombre as themselves. ”

“ Raphael, my cheeks burn when I think of it! Raphael, I am a Berners! I can live this life no longer! Come what will of it, I wish to give myself up to justice! Better to die a martyr's death than live an outlaw's life!"
"Oh, madam—!"
It was all the boy could bring out in words. But he clasped his hands, and gazed on her with an infinite compassion, deference, and devotion in his clear, candid, earnest blue eyes.
Sybil felt that she had gone a step too far in talking of her "martyr's death" to this sensitive young soul. ”

“ And Margaret ran into the hall door, and thence into her mother’s favorite parlor, on the threshold of which she stood appalled!
The two wax candles upon the mantelpiece were burning dimly, and their pale light fell ominously upon the figure of Mrs. Helmstedt, sitting on the short sofa, with her hands clasped rigidly together on her lap, her eyes fixed and strained outward, and her face blanched and frozen as if the hand of death had just passed over it. ”

“ That your birth was a curse to Hollis Elverton—a curse to me, and deeper still, a curse to you! That your love lighting upon any human being would be the darkest misfortune that could fall upon them! That your marriage with any man would be the direst catastrophe that could blight him—”
Her dreadful words were interrupted by a wild, half-suppressed shriek from Alma, who buried her face in her open hands for a moment, and then raising her head, cried:
“Mother, I must be marble!—yes, marble! I cannot be flesh and blood as others, or your words would kill me!” ”

“ Seven years had not changed Marian much—a little less vivid, perhaps, the bloom on cheeks and lips, a shade paler the angel brow, a shade darker the rich and lustrous auburn tresses, softer and calmer, fuller of thought and love the clear blue eyes—sweeter her tones, and gentler all her motions—that was all. Her dress was insignificant in material, make and color, yet the wearer unconsciously imparted a classic and regal grace to every fold and fall of the drapery. No splendor of apparel could have given such effect to her individual beauty as this quiet costume ”

“ He was inspired when in his agony that dreadful night he had cried out: "By a woman came sin and death into the world, and by a woman came redemption and salvation! Oh! Claudia, my Eve, farewell! And Bee, my Mary, hail!"
And now that he was about to betroth himself to Bee, and make her happy, he himself felt happier than he had been for many days. He felt sure, too, that when his heart should recover from its wounds he should love Bee with a deeper, higher, purer, and more lasting affection than ever his fierce passion for Claudia could have become. ”

“ At last the rumor reached Tom Jenkins, awaking him from the sweetest dream he had ever known. He could not ask Nellie if it were true, so he came to me; and when I saw how he grew pale and trembled, I felt that Nellie was not altogether blameless. But he breathed no word of censure against her; and when, a year or two afterward, I saw her given to William Raymond, I knew that the love of two hearts was hers; the one to cherish and watch over her, the other to love and worship, silently, secretly, as a miser worships his hidden treasure. ”

“ Say anything you like to me, dear Aunt Hannah! but never say a word against her!"
"But, poor boy! how will you bear the sure reproach of birth that you are bound to hear from others? Ah, Ishmael, you must try to fortify your mind, my dear, to bear much unjust shame in this world. Ishmael, the brighter the sun shines the blacker the shadow falls. The greater your success in the world, the bitterer will be this shame! ”

“ Such a journey, dear Garnet, will be your life if you set out upon it with ill-gotten riches. Now, look on the other side of the question. If you should start upon a journey that you know will bring you finally to a haven of rest and honor—no matter how common your vehicle, how rough your road, how ordinary the landscape, how full of unpleasant accidents—you will endure it, and at every stage with more cheerfulness, for knowing that it brings you nearer to its end, and that its end is repose and happiness. ”

“ It was an awful abyss, scooped out as it were from the very bowels of the earth, with its steep sides rent open in dreadful chasms, and far down in its fearful depths a boiling whirlpool of black waters.
Urging her reluctant steed through a thicket of stunted thorns and over a chaos of shattered rocks, Capitola approached as near as she safely could to the brink of this awful pit. ”

“ There was something in him to love, to lean upon, to worship—something far more reliable, more attractive, and more binding than mere masculine beauty—than the stately form, the dark, spirited countenance, and the fascinating gaiety, that had pleased her childish fancy. There was firmness, courage, fortitude, moral strength; something that a true woman loves to rest upon, serve, adore. A wild and passionate longing seized her heart—to go and stand by him in his emergency—to help to sustain him, if it were ever so slight a help, in this storm of opposition. ”

“ Oh! by the lost baronetcy of the house of Fairfax, my self-esteem will never recover the effects of it! Perdition seize the picturesque at this price! And ever since long before daybreak this morning, have we been wandering about over those mountain tops, with the earth below us hidden in mist and only the highest peaks looming through the sea of vapor like islands in the ocean! And we plunging wildly about in the fog, like death on the pale horse riding the waves! And to the momentarily recurring risk of riding over some hidden precipice of a thousand feet perpendicular. ”

“ Still, good Henrietta was passably happy, as the world goes, for she had the lucky foundation of a happy temper and temperament—she enjoyed the world, her friends and her creature comforts—her sound, innocent sleep—her ambling pony, or her easy carriage—her hearty meals and her dreamy doze in the soft armchair of an afternoon, while Mrs. L'Oiseau droned, in a dreary voice, long homilies for the good of the commodore's soul. ”

“ Yes, there she stood! the beautiful girl whose graceful form he had followed with a delighted gaze as she glided among the trees upon the banks of the dark lake. There she stood, in the perfect loveliness of her Oriental charms, one of Mohammed’s fabled houris descended upon the earth. There she stood—her elegant little figure drawn up to its full height, her graceful head slightly bent upon her bosom, her jet-black ringlets falling around her rich, warm, olive face, with its slender, arched eyebrows, its large, dark, burning eyes, and its crimson cheeks and lips. ”

“ A lashing, tossing, heaving, foaming, glancing rise and fall of liquid mountains and valleys, awful, but ravishing, to look on.
Ishmael stood leaning against the wheel-house, with his arms folded and his eyes gazing out at sea. His whole soul was exalted to reverence and worship, and he murmured within himself:
"It is the Lord that commandeth the waters; it is the glorious God that maketh the thunder!
"It is the Lord that ruleth the sea; the voice of the Lord is mighty in operation; the voice of the Lord is a glorious voice!" ”

“ Valentine was rather below the medium height, and slightly but elegantly formed, with a stately little head, delicate aquiline features, a complexion dark as a Spaniard's, bluish-black hair falling in many well-trained curls around the dark face, and light-blue eyes so deeply veiled under their thicket of long, close lashes, that it was only in moments of excitement, when they suddenly lightened, that their strange, startling, almost terrible contrast to the blackness of the hair and darkness of the skin could be noticed. ”

“ No mere words that I could speak could disturb your bosom’s peace. It is the awful conscience there that refuses to be silent,” said Hugh solemnly.
She paused before him, trembling all over; clenching her chest with her spread hands, as though to clutch the passion there; her eyes burning in their intense lurid fire, in fearful contrast with the ghastly paleness of her brow and cheeks, and gasped between her white lips:
“You are an incendiary, sent here to convulse my soul with war, until Reason herself is hurled from her throne! Man! man! You know what civil war in a nation is. ”

“ How the wind raves, this bitter night, around that bleak, sea-girt, snow-covered island! how the waters roar as they break upon the beach! Not a star is out. Above, black, scudding clouds sail, like ships, across the dark ocean of ether—below, ships fly, like clouds, before the wind, across the troubled waters; thus sky and ocean seem to mingle in the fierce chaos of night and storm. ”

“ Winterose was the first to break it.
"Gem! how dare you do such dreadful things?" she demanded, speaking more harshly than she had ever before spoken to her spoiled child.
"It's enough to break anybody's heart to hear her say that," whimpered Miss Tabby, wiping her eyes.
"And, oh! what a sign and an omen! If there's any truth in the spell, her mother—if so be she is her mother and is a living—her mother loves her better than any one in the world, and is a hurrying to see her now! For I never knew that to fail," said Miss Libby, clasping her hands and rolling up her eyes. ”

“ I beheld the strong emotion that she could not conceal. Some hours after that I was near her, when unobserved by all except myself, and unconscious of my presence also, she chanced to witness the reconciliation between yourself and your chosen bride. I saw her face grow paler than death, and then the meek head bow in submission, and the meek hands fold as in prayer, and the meek voice murmur low and fervently, ‘Thank God! Oh! God help me to say that sincerely.’ I had been interested in her before; but I saw that, and I loved her from that hour, the sweet, the lovely, the Madonna-like maiden! ”

“ So felt Edith as she sometimes lifted her eyes from her work to the beauty and glory of nature around her. And if now her heart ached it was more with grief for Fanny's fate than dread of her own. There comes, borne upon the breeze that lifts her dark tresses, and fans her pearly cheeks, the music of many rural voices—of rippling streams and rustling leaves and twittering birds and humming bees. ”

“ Nettie, my heart’s core! whose thought has power to banish even the image of my young bride from my mind!—to banish it, because fair and lovely and loving as she is—her fantastical and selfish passion, flattering as it is—is a more selfish thing than your sweet affection, my darling child. Yet she is beautiful, this fervid Ambrosia! And once this business settled—this deed that secures wealth and rank to my Nettie, executed and recorded, I shall be free to yield up soul and senses to this dream of passion. ”