Felicia Skene

“ Clayton, "I have shown you why, in a worldly point of view, it is necessary that Mary should not remain with you. I have myself far higher motives for requiring of you that she should be entrusted to my own care. I dare not, Agnes, consider you fit, at least at present, to guide an immortal soul in that most difficult and painful course of bitter self-denial which alone can bring us to the feet of the Crucified. In the most important occasion of your life, you have preferred your own will to the will of God. You have thrown off the yoke of the Saviour, who bade you serve Him in suffering. ”

“ She was perfectly aware, as a Christian, what a great and grievous sin Richard and Agnes had committed in their marriage; but, as a daughter, she considered it unwarrantable in herself to allow her mind to dwell one moment on their failings; and she had never opened her lips on the subject to any human being, or allowed a whisper connected with it to meet her ear. But as for concealment, Mary was too guileless to suppose that it could exist; she had never doubted but that Lord and Lady Verney were thoroughly acquainted with all circumstances connected with herself and her family. ”

“ Careless and worldly as Richard Clayton had been, he never could have thought, with any thing but horror, of the awful sin of suicide--that crime which never can be repented of! And to find that this beloved daughter, for whom he had so securely anticipated an eternity of happiness, although for his sake this mortal life had grown so bitter to her--to find that she, in her agony, had forgotten alike her faith and her obedience, and had rushed madly to the destruction both of soul and body, was more than the father, broken spirited and feeble, could endure. ”

“ But there is another far deeper misery which rises up from the grave of the departed to overwhelm us, when it is, so to speak, the soul of him who is gone forth that we have loved; the soul whose superior holiness has been perhaps like the brightness of an angel to our less elevated gaze, whose goodness has won our reverence, whose gentleness has gained our deepest love. ”

“ She struggled fearfully for utterance; it was so terrible to see her efforts that Agnes sank upon her knees beside her, and clasping her cold hands, exclaimed--"Dear, dear Elizabeth, I know what you would say, it is for your children; fear nothing, they shall be safe and happy in my keeping; I will be as a mother to them."
"Yes," said Richard, bending over her; "my poor wife, be at rest; do not doubt our love and care; together we will live only to watch over those dear children." ”

“ For six months he lingered with the seal of death set surely on his forehead, and his young existence ebbing visibly away. Mr. Lambert attended him assiduously; and when, at length, the sun of his life set in its untimely night, he laid him in the grave by the side of Elizabeth and Richard, feeling that another victim was added to the number of those who had suffered by that man's unholy deed. Whilst he taught the penitent mother that it was not for them to speculate on his future fate, they must only resign him in unquestioning obedience to the mercy of his God. ”

“ It was some days before Richard was sufficiently recovered to inquire how it fared with his daughter since she had learnt the utter destruction of her whole earthly happiness. The misery which Mary Clayton was enduring would have been altogether insupportable to her but for one thought of holy hope. The affection she felt for him she had believed was to be her husband, was of a nature to be felt but once in a lifetime, and never to be forgotten or replaced--full of an unchanging clinging tenderness, which must turn to bitterest suffering if rejected. ”

“ Richard had found a powerful attraction in the society of Elizabeth Maynard. The first feeling with which she inspired him was one of profound compassion for the position in which she was placed. He saw that her young life was wasting away cheerless and dark, unbrightened by one ray of the sweet human love which is the sunshine of this world, and whose gentle influence is mighty in power to still the tempests and the cutting blasts of sorrow which every mortal man shall meet with on his path of life. ”

“ One thought alone was present in the mind of Elizabeth Clayton--a thought so torturing and unsupportable that she strove to escape from it with that impotent frenzy which in its full development drives men to the awful crime of self-destruction. She had a RIVAL in her SISTER! The wife whom she had dreaded would supplant her after her death, would be her, who for two years past had called her husband--brother! It was an idea too horrible even to have entered into her mind, had it not been literally forced upon her by the words of Richard himself. ”

“ Agnes was completely subdued. She fancied that Richard was cruel to her, but still he was her husband, and she loved him. It was a mockery to say that he gave her any choice; she had no alternative; she could not go and shut herself up from him; she must submit to wear ever a smile as gay as her heart was sad. It was with a dreary sense of desolation that she thought how she must drive back all her feelings within her own breast, and never hope for the sympathy which, with her naturally frank disposition, she would so earnestly have sought ”

“ They sat together now in the darkened room from which their father's coffin had been carried an hour before, and both were in bitter sorrow. It is a blessed thing, that atmosphere of love which pervades this whole wide restless world, emanating, no doubt, from the unseen presence of Him who is Love, and penetrating, in some one shape or other, into the life of the most forlorn amongst us. ”

“ Agnes herself, though she never ceased to regret her sister, gradually recovered her natural cheerfulness and gaiety of heart. Occupation is the sovereign remedy for despondency, and she had but little time now to brood over the past. Full of the sad enthusiasm with which we seek to fulfil our duties to the dead, she gave herself up almost entirely to the care of her sister's children, both of whom required much of her time and attention. ”

“ What in truth could be more charming than to go from house to house, informing every one that, after the most reprehensible conduct of Agnes, it would be impossible to visit her, or to acknowledge her acquaintance? Agnes! the haughty and exclusive person, who had refused to call upon her! Mrs. Sharp had such really substantial grounds for all she said, that she was listened to with more attention than she usually met with. ”

“ It seemed to her, when she was thus suddenly flung down from her bright hope and joy into such exceeding wretchedness, as though the eyes that were to look on him no more might well refuse to meet again the light of day; and the sinking heart revolt from bearing the heavy load of that dark cheerless future, which was all that now remained to her on earth Her sorrow had every aggravation which man could give it; for not only was she rejected and cast off by him to whom she had trusted for her life's happiness, but she was treated with the most unmerited and cutting contempt by his family. ”

“ Fear nothing, then; go and sleep in peace; to-morrow we will make some arrangement by which we can defy the world to separate us."
And Agnes did rest calmly that night with Mary nestling in her arms. She felt as though she must keep guard over this precious child, even through the darkness, lest they stole her away; but she trusted with the most perfect security to Richard's assurances, nothing doubting that he could perform what he had promised. ”

“ Hardman was systematic in everything: systematic in selfishness, in covetousness, and in the virtues which he deemed necessary to his respectability. He had as keen a relish for money-making as his partner, Mr. Maynard, but his toil and labour were to a certain end. He was a man who could judge of cause and effect, and the desire of wealth was not with him a passion absorbing in itself; he sought to make a fortune because it was his will and pleasure to enjoy the good things of life ”

“ Before, however, they could even reach the door, it burst open, and Agnes flew into the room breathless with an overwhelming joy, and flung herself half-sobbing half-laughing into her sister's arms. For a moment neither spoke; the orphans, who had so long been all in all to each other, were together once more, and their happiness was too great for utterance. When at length Agnes disengaged herself from her sister's embrace, Elizabeth almost started in astonishment at the change which an interval of nearly two years had made upon her. ”

“ The love of Him, who first loved us, alone should reign supreme in the immortal soul, and all other feelings be the rather called fourth by it, as flowers give out fragrance when the sun shines on them; but if an earthly affection, however lawful in itself, be permitted to supersede it, thereby becoming a sinful indulgence, then does the holier love fade and perish away before that engrossing influence, like the pure sunlight when the night sets in.
Day and night, waking and sleeping, Elizabeth had no thought but for her husband ”

“ But Agnes was now a penitent, not in name only; and she was ready--nay, anxious--to humble herself in the sight both of God and man. As for Mary, she could not but think that she was perhaps more fit to be within that church than many who came there; for she was well disposed to believe--in her case at least--that beautiful Eastern superstition which holds that those who labour under any mental infirmity are the favoured of heaven; that many things are shown to them of which we dream not; and that they hold converse with the holy angels, as we think the little infants also do. ”

“ With ineffable satisfaction her husband saw her sally forth every morning, without having even remembered to take that peculiar cognizance of his own proceedings for the day, which often inspired him with a wild and frantic desire to embark forthwith for New Zealand, or to fly and endeavour to make a fortune in Kamtschatka. Mr. Sharp might do as he pleased now; he might have written a letter every day to his client without her looking over his shoulder, and he might have drawn up ever so many marriage contracts without her even asking who the parties were. ”